Fiction

So, Poppets, we meet again to discuss books and whatever else I feel is relevant--you, of course, have no say-so in subject matter--but I'm sure we can find some things to "chat" about as we go along. So, did everyone make it through Mother's Day--without a guilty conscience, that is? I hope all of you who have mothers--and are lucky enough to be in that position--thought of a card and/or present to honor the fact you do have a mother, still, in your life. By and large, we mothers meant well, and had to learn some lessons, and shed some tears, and are proud of our children's lives and achievements--and deserve every box of candy and card we get!

Didja see the pictures of the royal wedding? (How could you have avoided them--they were all over the place!) Lovely bride with an elegant wedding dress, her groom looked dashing, and they are off on their honeymoon--well done, guys! Now, we have Prince Harry--and he'll be a handful for some blushing bride (which, actually, in this day and age rarely blush after the 7th grade!) So, I walked into the library, here in Liberal, and found a movie cut-out poster, 8 ft. high, of Robert Pattinson,of the Vampire movies, behind my chair--and not a vampire in sight, although there were snickers from the staff!

So, this is the easy way to segue into my first Fiction title--"The Girl Who Would Speak for the Dead," by Paul Elwork, and it combines mystery and fantasy and has received excellent reviews. "It is the summer of 1925: Emily Stewart and her brother, Micheal, are 13-year-old twins--privileged, precocious, and wandering aimlessly around their family's Philadelphia estate." Emily spends her days imagining characters and strange creatures and Micheal "keeps to himself", reading by the river and longing for mysteries to solve. One day Emily discovers "a secret talent--she can secretly crack a joint in her ankle so the sound seems to burst in mid-air" and, quite naturally, the children who live around there are fascinated by these "spirit knockings."

Now, the year, again, is 1925 and many adults are still affected by WW1 and these sounds and signs are upsetting to them. Finally, their "game" spins out of their control with fatal results, for them and others who've been touched . A good read.

Now, onto a very well-known author, Jayne Ann Krentz, (writing as Amanda Quick) who has written the second book of the "Looking Glass Trilogy", entitled "Quicksilver". She is always an interesting reach-out-to-grab-you writer. This book should be no exception, concerning, as it does, the adventures in Victorian times of a glass reader, Virginia Dean, and a paranormal investigator, Owen Sweetwater (you just know that they are destined to come together in the 3rd novel!)

There are psychical as well as physical monsters who are preying on women and children in Victorian England and Sweetwater, who is a member of the exclusive Arcane Society, is always ready to defend them from the monsters. Virginia knows that "dark energy emanates from mirrors" and she can sense it and read it, and while other members of the Arcane Society may think she's "a charlatan, even a criminal", Sweetwater knows her powers of glass reading are very real. Then, there is the factor, in every good story, of romance, mystery, and, in this case, a dangerous "dark spirit" lurking in the mirrors that some characters want to contact and others to destroy. I have certainly enjoyed exploring this strange, passionate story and I'm certain others will.

I've never read any of James Patterson's series, "The Women's Murder Club", but I've certainly heard about the 10 books recounting their adventures--and here's his newest, "Tenth Anniversary"--which also means, actually, several mysteries to look into. The wedding celebration of Det. Lindsay Boxer is marred by the discovery of a mutilated teenage girl, left to die, and no trace of her newborn baby, and Asst. District Attorney, Yuki Castellano, is in the process of prosecuting a woman accused of murdering her husband in front of their two children--which comes to a screeching halt when Boxer says she has evidence that could free the wife. That dilemma becomes a choice of "should she trust her best friend or follow her instinct?"

So, there is mystery, human elements of revenge and love, and I believe I can state "without fear of contradiction", that an author who has sold more then 250 MILLION copies of his works knows how to grab people's interest and keep it until the last page. His characters are always "human", as their problems are any of ours--and the solutions seem to work well for all. I am not in favor of printing stories with so much white page surrounding the words--I always feel a little cheated as if the author should have written more--but certainly in this case, the story carries well. The character of Lindsay Boxer and her new husband, Joe, are loving and believable, so get it and enjoy.

If anything happens to Danielle Steele so that she, mercifully, stops producing mediocre books every time she sneezes (you can tell she is not one of my favorite authors!), don't despair, dear Poppets, because we always have the mother-daughter team of Mary and Carol Clark. Yes. For a long time, I predict, we'll have Mary and Carol, unlike one of my favorite radio comedy teams--Amos and Andy--or Abbott and Costello--or Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin (the last 2 teams in the movies).

However, Carol Higgins Clark has a new one out, "Mobbed", and it features P.I. (you do know that's for "Private Investigator", I assume) Regan Reilly and her husband, Jack, head of the NYPD Major Case Squad, who are going to the Jersey shore for the week-end to celebrate Regan's mother's birthday. Her mother calls and asks if Regan can come up right away and Regan does and learns it's all about an outrageous garage sale, and the contents are everything that the young and beautiful actress, Cleo Paradise, left behind when she mysteriously fled her house.

Regan's mother, Nora, had just had a jolting conversation with her best friend, Karen Fulton, who's learned that selling Cleo's "stuff" was her mother, Edna's, idea. Karen's heading East but asks Nora to please go to the house and curtail her mother's "plan." (It's too late to cancel that plane flying over the beach with a banner advertising the sale of Cleo Paradise's belongings). Once inside the house, Regan and her mom, Nora, start to speculate over why, exactly, would Cleo leave all her belongings behind? Good suspenseful story!

So, as George Burns used to say, at the end of his and Gracie Allen's radio and TV show, "Say goodnight, Gracie" and she would obediently say, "Goodnight, Gracie" and so I say this to you--in the sense that our chat over books, for this time at least, is over. Enjoy each day, stop smoking--period--, remember "Father's Day" is fairly soon, and be friendly to strangers passing through--a smile is only a frown turned upside down! Bye!