What we’re reading

 

LUCY BURDETTE: You know I adore this topic (and I know many of you do too) even though I honestly have more books in my multiple piles than I could finish in a lifetime. But new sparkly titles are constantly getting published, along with favorites from my most favorite authors, and reminders about older books that I’ve overlooked. Aside from all that, I’m judging a contest that I am forbidden to discuss. So I’m accumulating a teetering stack of books that might be right up your alley that I can’t mention!  I’m trying the technique of alternating the books I’m dying to read with the ones that are part of my contest obligations.

Most enjoyable books of the spring so far? Kristin Hannah’s THE WOMEN, Rhys Bowen’s THE ROSE ARBOR (one of her very best!), Kent Krueger’s THE RIVER WE REMEMBER…and I’m so looking forward to Barb Ross’s TORN ASUNDER and Jenn’s LOVE AT FIRST BOOK, and so many more—just look at my recent pile—wahhh! Reds, what are you reading?

HALLIE EPHRON: I just finished reading a book that Sarah Weinman suggested in a roundup of recommendations. It’s an oldie and now I’m wondering how I missed the series. I read DEATH AND THE PENGUIN by Andre Kurkov. Wonderful dark humor in a book with a detective/aspiring writer who’s in a dead end job writing obituaries and, oh by the way, he has a pet penguin. Highly recommend. 

And fascinated as I am by the movie business and alcoholic mega-stars, I’m reading COCKTAILS WITH GEORGE AND MARTHA, and nonfiction by Philip Gefter. It’s about the genesis and filming of WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF. From Edward Albee to Mike Nichols to Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton: utterly fascinating. Also an excellent doorstop.

I also loved Rhys’s THE ROSE ARBOR which I tore into the minute I got my hands on an advance copy.

JENN McKINLAY: Count me in for Rhys’s THE ROSE ARBOR! Such a fascinating story. I loved it. Also, I’m reading YOU’D LOOK BETTER AS A GHOST by Joanna Wallace. Very original! I can’t even describe how different it is but I’m enjoying it tremendously. Recently, I read WEYWARD by Emilia Hart and could not put it down. It was excellent.

RHYS BOWEN: Aw, I’m blushing because you all said nice things about The Rose Arbor! Thank you. It was a complicated book and I was relieved that it worked out so well in the end. What am I reading? I’m returning the compliment… Jenn’s LOVE AT FIRST BOOK.  It was exactly what I needed right now having had a stressful first half of the year with radiation for John, lots of strange doctor visits (the symptoms were strange, not the doctors). So I’m savoring Ireland and Jenn’s snappy dialog. Always so good. I’ve reread the Paris book at least twice.  

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I just read two absolutely fabulous books, completely fabulous! By two of my favorite authors, and was so honored to interview them afterward. The first is CLOSE TO DEATH— and I know I go on and on and on about how much I adore Anthony Horowitz and his brilliant meta-fiction, and they just get better and better. This book is absolutely terrific in every way, and sometimes I just had to stop reading and applaud. You know, this is the series where I Anthony Horowitz the author is a character in the book. I don’t know how he managed to do it so beautifully.

And the other book I just read, and adore is THE LAST MURDER AT THE END OF THE WORLD by Stuart Turton—- it’s sort of a dystopian utopia, yes, truly, or Agatha Christie meets the apocalypse on an isolated island. The world has ended, and there are only 121 people left, and they live this idyllic life – – although the reader is aware, something is not quite idyllic :-) – – until someone is murdered. And that’s like, chapter 1. This is an absolute tour de force in genre bending, with a solid mystery underneath.

It strikes me in discussing these—that both authors have written an intriguing, unique complex, unusual, pushing-the- envelope novel, but underneath both still depend on a satisfying, believable, and fair traditional mystery .

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Joining the dittos on Rhys’s THE ROSE ARBOR! I loved it! So well plotted, and I particularly loved the characters and the details of the late sixties setting.

Also, I’ve listened to the audiobook of THE WOMEN by Kristin Hannah, narrated by Julia Whelan, my absolute favorite female narrator, and was blown away. It’s one of those books that makes you feel desperate for someone to talk to about it when you’ve finished it. AND I finally, finally (I think I’m the last person in the world!) read LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus, and of course it is just brilliant. It was nice to read these one right after the other–similar themes, similar time period (LESSONS is a bit more than a decade earlier,) and then Rhys’s book also is set in the same time period as THE WOMEN. I listened to the audio of Marion McNabb’s SOME DOUBT ABOUT IT, which I really enjoyed. And now I’ve started Elly Griffith’s THE LAST WORD, but i picked up Jenn’s LOVE AT FIRST BOOK and will not be putting this one down until I finish it. So good!!!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Hank, I saw THE LAST MURDER AT THE END OF THE WORLD and thought it was calling my name, but you've sold me - it definitely sounds like my kind of read. 

Loved THE ROSE ARBOR and LOVE AT FIRST BOOK (don't hate us because we get advanced copies, dear readers!) and I also recently read Tessa Wegert's next Shana Marchant mystery, THE COLDEST CASE. It's a little Agatha Christie combined with frigid weather and a great detecting couple, so if that appeals, pre-order it now!

Catching up with what everyone else raved about, I tore through Benjamin Stevenson's EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY HAS KILLED SOMEONE and EVERYONE ON THIS TRAIN IS A SUSPECT. I can see why HBO has picked this up. 

Next up, VILLAGE IN THE DARK, Iris Yamashita's follow-up to one of the most original mysteries of  '23, VILLAGE UNDER ONE ROOF. No science fiction! That's a first for me.

LUCY AGAIN: That's enough from us, but we'd love to hear what you're reading!