Half Notes from Berlin by B V Glants – #BookReview – #historicalfiction

Book Blurb:

Berlin, 1933. Hans believes he and his family are safe from persecution.

Then, he discovers his family’s dirty secret: his maternal grandparents were Jews who converted to Christianity.

Driven by the desire to understand who he is and whether his mother’s blood really is tainted, Hans befriends Rebecca, the only Jewish girl he knows. Perhaps if Jewish blood isn’t evil, his mother will be ok.

To be a Jew in Hitler’s Germany is dangerous. But to fall in love with one is unthinkable.

Desperate to keep both his family’s true heritage and his love for Rebecca a secret, Hans attempts to navigate this terrifying new world. He’s disconsolate when his Jewish mother is kicked out from the Berlin Conservatory. He’s disgusted by his Aryan father’s aims to acquire Jewish business on the cheap.

Worst, he must watch helplessly as his classmates target Rebecca with increasing violence and malice.

But when his school announces it will expel Jewish students, Hans is determined to fight for Rebecca — and for the lives and souls of his family.

His Review:

Young love is always passionate and heartfelt. Germany in the early 1930s was not the time for a young boy to fall in love with a Jewish girl. She was born in Germany and attended the Lutheran Church but that mattered not to the Third Reich. Her grandparents were German Jews and that meant she had tainted blood. Rebecca is the smartest girl in the school as well as the prettiest. Hans has loved her since their second year in school and they became inseparable.

His grandparents were also Jewish, but his parents disavowed any connection with that heritage. His mother looked like her father, a perfect white Arian young man, and therefore the family was considered pure German.

The rise of the Third Reich caused a schism in Germany prior to WWII. The Jews were bankers and moneylenders because it was against the Christian religion to either borrow or lend. Therefore, the Jews controlled the banks and set the rates for borrowing.

Survival of any Jew in the Third Reich though meant immigrating to Israel or another country. Rebecca and her family left Germany because of the ban on doing any business with Jewish-owned businesses or banks.

Because the way to become accepted in German society for a young man was to join the Hitler Youth, Hans had no choice but to join and wear the uniform. His love for a Jewish girl, however, was ridiculed throughout middle school. He enters the military but the love of his life is gone. He is wounded during the 2^nd World War and decorated many times but he never forgot his first love.

A well-plotted and paced narrative with emotional themes and unrequited love during war time. It is an interesting but sad saga. 4.5 stars – CE Williams

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this book.

Rosepoint Publishing: Four point Five Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Jewish Literature, Historical German Fiction, Jewish Historical Fiction
Publisher: Anchor Media
ASIN: B0B9BNBZHD
Print Length: 256 pages
Publication Date: October 4, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley
Title Links: Half Notes from Berlin [Amazon]
Barnes & Noble

The Author: B.V. Glants was born in Soviet Ukraine and immigrated with his family to suburban New Jersey when he was ten years old. Raised on family stories ranging from his grandparents’ fight for survival in WW2 to his parents’ confrontations with Soviet antisemitism, he now lives in Silicon Valley with his wife and daughter.

B.V. Glants is a lay leader at a Jewish day school, a Wexner Heritage Program member, and a technology entrepreneur, most recently having cofounded Tonic Health (sold to R1, NASDAQ:RCM) and Turnkey Labs. That hasn’t stopped him from earning an MFA at California College of the Arts and attending writers’ conferences at Squaw and Sewanee. He writes historical fiction from a Jewish perspective, focusing on how major historical events challenge and transform the lives of everyday families. Half Notes from Berlin is his first published novel.

2022 CE Williams – V Williams

Rosepoint Pub

The Dutch House: A Novel by Ann Patchett – #Audiobook Review – narrated by Tom Hanks – #ThrowbackThursday

Rosepoint Publishing: Five Stars

Best Literature & Fiction

Book Blurb:

Ann Patchett, the number-one New York Times best-selling author of Commonwealth, delivers her most powerful novel to date: a richly moving story that explores the indelible bond between two siblings, the house of their childhood, and a past that will not let them go. The Dutch House is the story of a paradise lost, a tour de force that digs deeply into questions of inheritance, love, and forgiveness, of how we want to see ourselves, and of who we really are.

At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate empire, propelling his family from poverty to enormous wealth. His first order of business is to buy the Dutch House, a lavish estate in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia. Meant as a surprise for his wife, the house sets in motion the undoing of everyone he loves.

The story is told by Cyril’s son Danny, as he and his older sister, the brilliantly acerbic and self-assured Maeve, are exiled from the house where they grew up by their stepmother. The two wealthy siblings are thrown back into the poverty their parents had escaped from and find that all they have to count on is one another. It is this unshakable bond between them that both saves their lives and thwarts their futures.

Set over the course of five decades, The Dutch House is a dark fairy tale about two smart people who cannot overcome their past. Despite every outward sign of success, Danny and Maeve are only truly comfortable when they’re together. Throughout their lives, they return to the well-worn story of what they’ve lost with humor and rage. But when at last they’re forced to confront the people who left them behind, the relationship between an indulged brother and his ever-protective sister is finally tested.

My Review:

Okay, yes you got me! I enjoyed this book in no small part because the audiobook is narrated by Tom Hanks. Hanks literally becomes Danny, the main character but still never veers too far from that Academy-winning rad-da-tat animated delivery. I had to check the speed as there was more than once I thought I might have set it to 125% of normal. Gees, he’s good, and thank heaven or this could have become a rather slow burn at times.

As revealed by the blurb, Danny and his sister Maeve (7 years older) are kicked out of their very wealthy and lavish estate by their wicked step-mom after his father passes suddenly intestate. I may have been washing dishes at that point and missed how old the kids were at that point, but it was literally a case of rags to riches back to rags. They’d enjoyed the good life and then it ended.

So, Danny, always looked after by his big sister, may be the typical clueless male. I thought there were times he swerved into narcissism, while his stoic sister Maeve never takes her eyes off the ball. There were also times I wanted to slap him upside his head! Maeve has settled into a comfortable living but will not settle unless Danny does the same and using the one loophole their step-mother failed to see, she pushes him to higher learning. GO! Be a doctor! Dutifully, he does, all the while declaring he will never practice. (Thank heavens as his bedside manner would suck.)

What he does practice, wisely, is real estate. Hey, he had gleaned some knowledge from his father. Yes, and then because that was expected, a wife. But Danny, perhaps again mirroring his dad with his step-mother, marries a woman he really does not love. I doubt there would ever have been a woman who could take Maeve’s place. That is a sibling bond born of desperation and survival.

Through the decades this narrative covers, each, together and separately, go back to The Dutch House to see how it is faring. Amazingly well, as it turns out, although the same cannot be said of Andrea, the step-mom. It’s a great, hulking enormous estate, still oozing the original (Dutch) owners’ vibrations—a reason their mother fled after they moved in to go serve the poor where she felt she really belonged.

Heavy family dynamics, feelings of abandonment, sibling loyalty, loss, the characters well developed and, typically, 180 degrees in dreams and thought processes. Times I ached for Maeve, angry with Danny. The step-mom painted with all the warts of the stereotypical step-parent.

As always with an extremely successful novel, there are detractors, but this is a Pulitzer Prize finalist. And performed by Tom Hanks, I’d also bestow an honorary Audie. He is awesome.

I received a complimentary audiobook copy from my local well-stocked library. These are my honest thoughts.

Rosepoint Recommended-5 Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Coming of Age Fiction, Family Life Fiction, Literary Fiction
Publisher: HarperAudio
ASIN: B07NSJZWY5
Listening Length: 9 hrs 53 mins
Narrator: Tom Hanks
Publication Date: September 24, 2019
Source: Local Library (Audiobook Selections)
Title Link: The Dutch House [Amazon]
Barnes & Noble
Kobo

The Author:

Ann Patchett is the author of six novels, including Bel Canto, which won the Orange Prize for Fiction. She writes for the New York Times Magazine, Elle, GQ, the Financial Times, the Paris Review and Vogue. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

New York Times best seller | A Read with Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick | A New York Times Book Review Notable Book | Time Magazine’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2019 | 2020 Audie finalist – audiobook of the year and best male narrator

Named one of the Best Books of the Year by NPR, The Washington Post; O: The Oprah Magazine, Real Simple, Good Housekeeping, Vogue, Refinery29, and Buzzfeed

The Narrator:

Tom Hanks – Narrating this heartbreaking and compelling story is not the first connection between Patchett and Hanks. Patchett, the New York Times bestselling author of Commonwealth and State of Wonder, told the Associated Press that she and Hanks have become friends in recent years. Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson, have spent time with Patchett at Parnassus Books, the renowned bookstore she owns in Nashville, Tennessee. And in 2017, Patchett joined Hanks at a sold-out event sponsored by the Washington, D.C., bookstore Politics and Prose to interview him in conjunction with his promotion of Uncommon Type, his own collection of short stories.

[Info and photo attribute: BookBub]

#ThrowbackThursday

The Italian Daughter (The Lost Daughters Book 1) by Soraya Lane – #BookReview – #historicaleuropeanfiction

The Italian Daughter by Soraya Lane

“An absolutely unputdownable and stunning page-turner”

Book Blurb:

Italy, 1946: As Estee bids farewell to Felix her heart breaks. Thinking back to her childhood when the two friends ran through the cobbled streets of their picturesque town hand in hand, she thought they would never part. But when Estee was offered a place at the world renowned La Scala theatre, she had to say yes. It would change her family’s fortunes forever.

Soon after, Felix began working for his family bakery, famed across Italy for its deliciously sweet pastries. The two lovers were never far from each other’s minds but when Felix’s parents demanded that he marry well to unite two prominent families, Estee felt sure that she had lost him.

Now, Felix has asked her to make the bravest decision of her life and run away with him. But with so much at stake, can she really follow her heart?

London, present day: Lily clutches a worn Italian recipe and theatre programme in her hands, having just discovered that her grandmother was born in a home for unmarried mothers. The faded objects are the only clues to her past.

Accepting a job on an Italian vineyard –a dream of her late father–, Lily enlists the help of the charming Antonio to help solve the mystery. But arriving in Felix’s town, Lily unearths a tragic love story: of families bitterly torn apart and of two lovers who were prepared to sacrifice everything to be together.

When Lily finds out the truth about her family and who she really is, will Felix and Estee’s story give her the strength to also follow her heart?

An utterly enchanting and heartbreaking novel about lost loves, family secrets and enduring hope. Perfect for fans of Lucinda Riley, Santa Montefiore and Victoria Hislop.

His Review:

Italy has had a magnetic attraction to its citizens throughout the ages. Roman legions and Praetorian Guards longed for home even though thousands of miles away. Estee feels that pull even though she does not know why. Felix had gone missing and was nowhere to be found. Pregnant and alone, she disappears to London to give birth to a love child she simply has no way to care for and nurture as a single mother.

Estee’s great-grandmother had met and fallen in love with a man at Lake Como. He was betrothed to another but swore she was the one he would marry. However, when the time arose for the wedding, he was nowhere to be found. Pressure from the family required him to complete the arranged marriage planned for him as a boy.

Generations later Lily in America is given a box with two items, one a recipe for a mixture of chocolate and hazel nuts and the corner of a program from Teatro Alla Scala in Milan. Italy is calling her like a siren and she cannot ignore the urge to visit Italy. Yes, she has long black hair and almond eyes, but why the inextricable pull to visit a country she had never been to?

Soraya Lane has woven a generations old tale of broken hearts and lost loves! The fabric of this story is well woven with physical attraction and love torn asunder side by side. I found myself wrapped in sympathy for each of the women from these families who deserved love that was denied. Giving up a child out of wedlock is one of life’s most heart-wrenching experiences. These women kept their strong personal values while enduring terrible betrayal and pain.

The dual timeline is well-plotted and strongly descriptive, emotive, and atmospheric. Both timelines are equally engaging, WWII and present day. Gripping and hard to put down, the characters are strongly dominant and the writing style gripping. 4.5 stars – CE Williams

Many thanks to Bookouture and NetGalley for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this book.

Rosepoint Publishing: Four point Five Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Historical European Fiction, Literary Sagas, 20^th Century Historical Romance
Publisher: Bookouture
ASIN: B0B53Z9H3N
Print Length: 305 pages
Publication Date: September 23, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley
Title Link: The Italian Daughter [Amazon]

The Author: Soraya Lane graduated with a law degree before realizing that law wasn’t the career for her and that her future was in writing. She is the author of historical and contemporary women’s fiction, and her novel Wives of War was an Amazon Charts bestseller.

Soraya lives on a small farm in her native New Zealand with her husband, their two young sons and a collection of four legged friends. When she’s not writing, she loves to be outside playing make-believe with her children or snuggled up inside reading.

For more information about Soraya, her books and her writing life, visit sorayalane.com or http://www.facebook.com/SorayaLaneAuthor, or follow her on twitter @Soraya_Lane. She would love to hear from you.

Have a great week!

The Double Agent: A Novel by William Christie – #BookReview – #historicalthrillers

The Double Agent by William Christie

Book Blurb:

From a modern master of the classic espionage novel comes William Christie’s The Double Agent, featuring Alexsi Smirnoff – a Russian/German double agent loyal only to himself – in a desperate bid to protect himself, again becomes a double agent, this time for the English.

Alexsi Smirnoff – a Russian orphan – was trained as an agent by the Russian Secret Service and inserted into Nazi Germany, where he rose to a position in German intelligence services. As the war grinds on, trapped between two brutal dictatorships, Alexsi betrays both sides in a desperate ploy that succeeds…and fails. His false identities burned, his life at risk, Alexsi attempts to disappear in the hills – but is caught by the British.

Recruited by the SIS, and by “C” himself, Alexsi is once again a double agent. Initially betrayed by a Soviet agent inside the SIS (Kim Philby), Alexsi is sent beyond the reach of the Soviets, into Italy with a new identity as a sergeant in the German army. Settled into the headquarters of Field Marshall Albert Kesselring, Alexsi finds himself at the nexus at a critical point in World War II, balancing between the various forces vying for control in the Vatican, the Italian resistance, and the brutal German Army determined to maintain control of Northern Italy. And Alexsi, finally forced to choose sides over his own survival.

Sequel to the well-regarded A Single Spy, The Double Agent is a fast-paced, compelling novel of espionage in the most momentous and dangerous of times.

His Review:

Alexsi Ivanovich Smirnov was a deeply embedded agent in MI 6. He reported both to London and Moscow. Neither country knew that he worked for the other. His life was a tightrope with knives at both ends. The Nazis would shoot immediately if they knew that he reported to both sides. First, however, he could expect to be hanging from a meat hook in the basement of Gestapo headquarters.

The problem with being a dual agent is keeping both agencies satisfied. One slip and he would never see the light of day again. Their mutual enemy needed to be defeated by both countries. This book explores the problems faced by someone who is a slave to two masters. Information needs to be fed to the agencies without actually giving away something that could harm the other.

Well-paced and engaging. Empathetic MC. This well-written novel will entertain you and keep you in suspense. Enjoy! 4.5 stars – CE Williams

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this book.

Rosepoint Publishing: Four point Five Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Historical Thrillers, Espionage Thrillers
Publisher: Minotaur Books
ASIN: B09Q1Y9T1F
Print Length: 352 pages
Publication Date: November 15, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley
Title Links: The Double Agent (Amazon)
Barnes & Noble
Kobo

The Author: [Goodreads] WILLIAM CHRISTIE is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and a former Marine Corps infantry officer who commanded a number of units and served around the world. In addition to A Single Spy, he has written several other novels, published either under his own name or that of F.J. Chase.

Enjoy tyour weekend!

Rosepoint Reviews – August Recap—Woohoo, it’s September!

I mentioned last month the fun with new gardening possibilities and while the sauerkraut was a bust, the carrots did pretty well. The rest of the veggies in the gallon fermenter got too soft. Now, I have ripe cherry tomatoes coming out of my ears and already dried the first batch. A bit too much pepper on some, but otherwise, they are like little tomato-flavored candies.

Okay, admittedly, that has little to do with books, although an excellent reason I’m slow to read this month. Thank heaven for audiobooks and the CE!

us back in 62 — We don’t have any wedding pics, but I think this is in 1962.

Speaking of the CE…we will be celebrating our 60^th wedding anniversary on the 2^nd (cue the horns!). Hoping to do a couple things; still there are issues with gas and Covid. Because I am writing this ahead of those last three review posts, the links will be to Amazon rather than my review which I will edit upon return to my computer. (Sadly, I don’t know how to get a link to a review scheduled, not yet posted. Yes, I know—don’t say it.)

Together we did read or listen to nineteen books in August, most from NetGalley as I’m still working on the 500 badge; as I’m writing this, now up to a count of 494. So close!

The Wedding Plot by Paula Munier
Holy Chow by David Rosenfelt (audiobook)
The Last Sentinel by Simon Gervais (a CE review)
The Final Hunt by Audrey J Cole (a CE review)
Such a Beautiful Family by T R Ragan
Lie Down with Dogs by Liz Milliron (a CE review)
The Girl Who Escaped by Mark Nolan (a CE 5* review)
Overkill by Sandra Brown (a CE review)
Christmas Scarf Murder by Carlene O’Connor, Maddie Day, and Peggy Ehrhart
Bad Axe County by John Gallagan (audiobook)
Out of Patients by Sandra Cavallo Miller (a CE review)
Dark Rivers to Cross by Lynne Reeves (a CE review)
Murder at Black Oaks by Phillip Margolin (a CE review)
Lies She Told by Cate Holahan (audiobook)
Bernice Runs Away by Talya Tate Boerner (my 5*)
The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredericks (a CE 5* review)
A Sliver of Darkness by C J Tudor (scheduled—link to Amazon) (CE review)
The Double Agent by William Christie (scheduled—link to Amazon) (CE review)
The Italian Daughter by Soraya Lane (scheduled—link to Amazon) (CE review)

Reading Challenges

My challenges—promises, promises, promises. Yes, I caught it up! Not once, but twice as I lost all my input the first time. My challenges for 2022 are all listed and linked in the widget column on the right. You can always check out the progress of my challenges, if you are so inclined, by clicking the Reading Challenges page. I’m now at 73% of the Goodreads Challenge of 180 books at 132 and achieved my Audiobook Challenge of 30 and the Historical Reading Challenge of 25. I also achieved the yearly goal of 75 for Netgalley and Edelweiss, although of course, those books are all from NG.

Having to do over the Reading Challenges page taught me one thing: I’m not keeping up with it well. Not updating, nor reporting to the challenge hosts. My apologies. I think going forward I will undertake fewer challenges and not try to list individual entries to the challenge. Makes the page unwieldy and for what purpose? Tell me, honestly…have you ever looked at it?

Where the Crawdads Sing (my review of the book here by Delia Owens) starring Daisy Edgar-Jones—was excellent. Did you get a chance to view it? I’ll be doing a critical review discussing both shortly. I’d love to hear what you thought, too! Did you read the book?

We here in the upper Midwest had a beautiful August—I can’t complain—with pleasant temps during the day and cool in the evening perfect for sleeping. Did you get the kiddies off to school? We’ve been informed we are expecting our second great-grandchild. Too early to know boy or girl. In the meantime, the boy is trying to walk. He’s nine months. The fun begins…

Welcome to my new followers and as always I appreciate those who continue to read, like, share, and comment. Please let me know if you saw something above that got your interest.

Granny graphic attribute: wdrfree.com

The Lindbergh Nanny: A Novel by Mariah Fredericks- #BookReview – #historicalbiographicalfiction, #MinotaurBooks

The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredericks

Rosepoint Publishing: Five Stars

Book Blurb:

When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles, Sr., is the country’s golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there’s someone else in their household—Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny.

A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child, and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears.

Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night, in order to clear her own name—and to find justice for the child she loves.

His Review:

The kidnapping of the century happened in 1932. Charles Lindbergh’s son is missing and one of the primary suspects is his nanny, Betty Gow. She is an attractive young lady from Scotland who has come to the United States to make her fame and fortune. She is very well vetted by the Lindberghs prior to being hired to take care of their young son Charlie.

Charlie is very taken with his new nursemaid and sees her as his mother figure. His mother, Anne Morrow Lindberg, is busy making trips all over the globe with the first man to cross the Atlantic on a solo flight. Anne is a very attractive woman and achieves her pilot’s license during the time Betty was the nanny. Colonel Lindberg has set strict rules that the baby is to be put in his room from 8 until 10 at night and is not to be coddled! The baby is spirited from his room during those hours by a ladder set on the second floor of the family home.

During the deepest hours of the Great Depression many people are out of work. The ransom set at $70,000 is a very large amount during the time. The U.S. has just been taken off of the gold standard and the bills are all U.S. gold certificates with the serial numbers carefully recorded and the banks in the area alerted to anyone who uses the bills.

Betty is suspected of the crime and under continual suspicion. She has to return to Scotland because of the notoriety in the case but later returns. Some of his nightwear is found in the woods near the home and days later the body of baby Charles Lindbergh is also found fairly close to the home. Betty is totally devastated by the boy’s death and stays on through the investigation and trial.

This book is very well written and has some literary license taken to help support the final court decision in the case and the end story. The characters are very well developed and the narrative heartbreaking in its exposé. I found myself very sympathetic with Ms. Gow and the Lindbergh family. 5 stars – CE Williams

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with the opportunity to read and review this book.

Book Details:

Genre: Historical Biographical Fiction, Biographical Fiction, Historical Scottish Fiction
Publisher: Minotaur Books
ASIN: B09NTKJMWX
Print Length:
Publication Date: November 15, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley
Title Link: The Lindbergh Nanny [Amazon]
Barnes & Noble
Kobo

The Author: Mariah Fredericks was born and raised in New York City. She graduated from Vassar College with a degree in history. She enjoys reading and writing about dead people and how they got that way. She is the author of the Jane Prescott mystery series.

Enjoy your day!

Bernice Runs Away by Talya Tate Boerner – #BookReview – Women’s Literary Fiction

Bernice Runs Away by Talya Tate Boerner

Rosepoint Rating: Five Stars

Book Blurb:

Have you ever dreamed of running away?

Life hasn’t always been easy for Bernice, but she is reasonably content at the ripe age of eighty-one. She has raised two children, buried both her husband and son, and is doing okay despite a few minor health issues. When Bernice’s daughter, Sarah, insists the time has come for Bernice to forfeit her independence and move into her backyard carriage house, Bernice refuses.

“I have a perfectly good house in Arkansas. Why on earth would I move to Atlanta?”

Despite Bernice’s protestations, Sarah moves forward with death cleaning and estate sale planning as though Bernice has no say in the matter.

Bernice has plenty to say about a variety of things.

With Miss Fiona packed stem to stern with only those things that spark joy (thank you, Marie Kondo) and inspired by an old black-and-white photograph of her first true love, Bernice leaves her cozy home in Savage Crossing without a glance in the rearview mirror. And without a word to her family.

Once Bernice decides to run away, there is no telling what might happen next.

A charming story of second chances and the transcendent power of love, Bernice Runs Away clears away life’s clutter and gets to the truth of what is essential in life.

My Review:

The cover is cute, eye-catching, and compelling. But don’t let it fool you–this is prose-perfect literary fiction. If the cover didn’t get you, this beautiful narrative of Bernice will. Don’t worry about the age thing—this is an easily identifiable theme of family, relationships, and an inspirational story that is trans-generational.

What teenager, tired of parental guidance hasn’t thought to run away and rule their own lives? Independence, it seems, is hard won at any age and caregivers often become unwilling recipients.

Bernice’s daughter Sarah, worried about her mother aging in Savage Crossing alone in her old stone cottage, has gifted her with a book on “death cleaning” and if that is not enough, announced plans to move Bernice to the backyard bungalow in Atlanta being built for her—so she can be close.

Watched over.

Managed.

Bernice, like any independent adult rebels and begins plotting her escape. In the head of this octogenarian, the reader follows Bernice as she goes about her business dutifully clearing and cleaning (keeping only those things that “spark joy”), no way will she move to Atlanta. Her heart is in this home where she spent decades with her husband, now gone. She’s had a succession of cats, the current kitty being Dolly Parton—not as gregarious as her namesake—but still, she’s there.

What a poignant story, at times light-hearted or scary, riding with Bernice as she makes her way to Lake Norfolk, a special place in her heart, so many good memories! The little cabin that she booked with Jason, the owner of Cooper’s Bluff is perfect and the book becomes atmospheric with her efforts to prevail, do-overs and make-overs (old Bernice, new Bernice). Bernice is old school, old morality, and she is immensely empathetic. You can’t help but love her or the others in this character-driven novel.

As Bernice shares her memories and desires for tomorrow, the reader gleans that while age does not change desires of the heart and mind, some can be resolved.

So many quotables, including this, one of my favorites:

“Inhale. Exhale. Inhale bewilderment. Exhale disillusionment.”

Told in an easy pace (not to be confused with slow—as this is always engaging), the author has a wise sense of the decade, paints a casual kaleidoscope of visions as the story unfolds to a pleasing, satisfying conclusion. A lovely tale of adventure from a storyteller I’ll revisit with enthusiastic expectations.

I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the author and publisher through @NetGalley that in no way influenced this review. These are my honest thoughts.

Book Details:

Genre: Women’s Literary Fiction, Contemporary Literary Fiction, Women’s Friendship Fiction
Publisher: One Mississippi Press LLC
ASIN: B0B919LW6X
Print Length: 403 pages
Publication Date: October 1, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley

Title Link: Bernice Runs Away [Amazon]

The Author: Here are a few things about what makes me tick, and why we should be friends. I’m not afraid to drink from a regular garden hose or eat raw cookie dough. Unless I’m buying books or plants, I don’t like to shop. I love freshly ground coffee and logo t-shirts. I know how to make mud pies and snow cream and play dough from scratch. Yes, I’m a farmer’s daughter who really was raised in a barn.

I love interesting writing, some poetry, old movies, and hardback novels, especially southern classics. I have a degree in economics from Baylor University, and once upon a time worked for the previous owner of the Dallas Cowboys. My two grown children are the best people I know. I hope to be like them someday.

Clutter and incessant chatter make me crazy. I’m an extroverted introvert and need my quiet time. I’m inspired by music and nature. I have a butterfly garden in the backyard; milkweed is my favorite plant. I am an Arkansas Master Gardener and an Arkansas Master Naturalist.

I believe most any meal can be improved with a side of collard greens.

I live in Fayetteville, Arkansas with my husband and two schnauzers, Lucy and Annabelle (who rule the house). I think the Ozark Mountains are as gorgeous as any place on Earth.

Follow Talya at Grace, Grits and Gardening.

Rosepoint Recommended-5 Stars

Christmas Scarf Murder by Carlene O’Connor, Maddie Day, and Peggy Ehrhart – #BookReview – #TuesdayBookBlog

Christmas Scarf Murder by Carlene O’Connor, Maddie Day, and Peggy Ehrhart

Long Scarf Syndrome – The entanglement of the scarf’s free-floating end into moving machinery

Book Blurb:

Stocking stuffers like handknit scarves make the coziest of Christmas gifts—unless they’re used as accessories for murder!

CHRISTMAS SCARF MURDER by CARLENE O’CONNOR
When grinchy thefts steal the good cheer at a local nursing home, Siobhan O’Sullivan manages to identify one missing item before Kilbane, Ireland’s Christmas tractor parade—a hideous shamrock scarf wrapped around a very dead body. Now, with her holiday farmhouse bash approaching, Siobhan must dash to stop a deadly Secret Santa from gifting another unwanted surprise.

SCARFED DOWN by MADDIE DAY
It’s beginning to taste a lot like Christmas at Pans ‘N Pancakes, as twelve days of menu specials dazzle hungry locals. But the festivities go cold the instant a diner dies while knitting a brilliant green scarf. With Aunt Adele tied into a murder investigation, it’s all on Robbie Jordan to find out who’s really been naughty or nice in South Lick, Indiana.

DEATH BY CHRISTMAS SCARF by PEGGY EHRHART
Suspects pile up faster than New Jersey snow when frosty-tempered Carys Walnutt is found strangled by a handmade scarf auctioned at Arborville’s tree-lighting ceremony. Between a winning bidder hiding behind the alias “S. Claws” and a victim who deserved coal in her stocking, can Pamela Paterson and the crafty Knit and Nibble ladies freeze a killer’s merry murder plot?

My Review:

Fun, fast, and easy book to kick off the Christmas reading holidays! This anthology is headlined by Carlene O’Connor, whose Irish Village Mystery series feature Detective Sargeant Siobhan O’Sullivan and hubby Garda O’Sullivan in this offering, Christmas Scarf Murder. Always a treat with the Irish countryside-themed mysteries. This storyline covers the death of a tractor parade participant and triggered my short research into Long Scarf Syndrome—it’s a real (and deadly) occurrence. The O’Sullivan’s are entertaining their very large family for the Christmas holidays with the goal of solving this one by Christmas Eve.

The second, Scarfed Down by Maddie Day is part of her Country Store Mystery series set in South Lick, Indiana (fictional, French Lick is not), of course, the proximity caught my attention. I greatly enjoy her writing style as well.

“Boy, howdy, Robbie, it’s colder than a bullfrog’s hind leg out there and darker than a pocket.”

“That would definitely slot me into the Too Stupid to Live category.”

She’s always busy tending her restaurant/country store and hosting a knitting group. It’s the latter that’s key to this novella, entertaining a lively bunch of knitters along with Christmas-themed dishes for the diner end of the business.

I’m not familiar with Peggy Ehrhart who included her Death by Christmas Scarf in the Christmas scarf-themed compilation. The third story features Pam Paterson who engages with her Knit and Nibble group in an interesting use of knit one, purl one during WWII (Spy-Craft: The Knitting Spies of World War II…”). The ingenious methods of communication during that war never ceases to amaze me.

These Christmas scarf-themed cozy mystery novellas are a lovely way to kick off the season, expected to release late September and currently on preorder. Love the Irish setting and the husband/wife team in O’Connor’s books and the location and sense of humor in Maddie Days’ books.

I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the author and publisher through @NetGalley that in no way influenced this review. These are my honest thoughts.

Rosepoint Rating: Four point Five Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Mystery Anthologies, Holiday Fiction
Publisher: Kensington Cozies
ASIN: B09PJ228LB
Print Length: 351 pages
Publication Date: September 27, 2022
Source: Publisher and NetGalley

Title Link(s):

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

The Authors:

Carlene O’Connor is the USA Today bestselling author of the acclaimed Irish Village Mysteries, the County Kerry Novels, and the Home to Ireland Mysteries. Born into a long line of Irish storytellers, her great-grandmother emigrated from Ireland filled with tales in 1897 and the stories have been flowing ever since. Of all the places she’s wandered across the pond, she fell most in love with a walled town in County Limerick and was inspired to create the town of Kilbane, County Cork, the setting of her Irish Village Mystery series. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime, and currently divides her time between Southern California and the Emerald Isle. Please visit her online at CarleneOConnor.net.

Maddie Day is the Agatha Award and Macavity Award-winning author of the Cozy Capers Book Club Mystery series and the Country Store Mysteries, as well as other series written under the name Edith Maxwell. A member of Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America, she is a regular contributor at Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen and belongs to The Wickeds, a group of six bestselling authors who blog at WickedAuthors.com. Day lives with her beau north of Boston, though she knows both Indiana and Cape Cod intimately. She is a talented amateur chef and gardener and can be found online at MaddieDayAuthor.com.

Peggy Ehrhart is a former English professor who lives in Leonia, New Jersey, where she writes mysteries and plays blues guitar. She holds a Ph.D. in medieval literature from the University of Illinois and taught writing and literature at Queens College, CUNY, and Fairleigh Dickinson University, where she was a tenured full professor. Her short stories have appeared in Futures Mystery Anthology Magazine, Crime and Suspense, Flashing in the Gutters, Spinetingler, Crime Scene: New Jersey 2, and Murder New York Style. A longtime member of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime, Peggy served on the board of MWA New York as head of the Mentor Committee. She was president of Sisters in Crime NY/TriState from 2013 to 2015. Peggy regularly attends mystery-writing conferences and participates in conference panels and gives talks on mystery fiction at libraries in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey.