Book Review: TRACED by Catherine Jinks

 

 

Title: TRACED

Author:  Catherine Jinks

Read: January 2025

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description (Goodreads):

 

Jane is a contact tracer. She has to call a lot of people and some of them don’t want to talk. Various reasons—tax or immigration issues, infidelity. Domestic abuse.

Jane knows all about that. She and her daughter Tara have spent years in hiding from Tara’s manipulative and terrifying ex. Now, as Jane talks to a close contact, she realises the woman on the phone is scared of the same man—and he’s close. Too close.

Suddenly the past comes slamming back into the present as Jane realises she and Tara can’t keep running forever.

One day, they’re going to be found.

My musings:

 

This book was utterly terrifying! TRACED starts with our main protagonist, Jane, a covid-19 contact tracer, calling people who have unwittingly been exposed to the virus and reminding them to isolate for 14 days until they have been declared virus-free. Nicole, her latest client, sounds absolutely terrified when she hears that her cousin has just tested covid-positive. She confides in Jane that she is scared that her fiancé, who controls her every move, will be furious that she allowed her cousin to visit, and that she is afraid for her life. At first, Jane thinks that Nicole is overreacting – but once she hears who her fiancé is, she knows that Nicole’s life truly is in danger.

 

We soon learn that Jane speaks from experience: her own daughter Tara only narrowly escaped from the clutches of her abusive, controlling ex, which involved changing her name and moving to a place he would never think to look for her. After being so very careful, Jane has once more crossed his path, and she is terrified that he will come after her and Tara.

 

TRACED was a taut domestic thriller with a constant undercurrent of danger that built tension as it raced towards its utterly terrifying finale. It was frightening and confronting to witness Jane and Tara’s well-grounded fears and their feeling of helplessness as once again the noose threatens to tighten around their necks, despite all their efforts to stay under the radar. I found Jane’s voice extremely compelling, to a point where I fervently wished death upon one particular character in the book. I was biting my nails as the inevitable showdown neared!

 

TRACED surpassed all my expectations and is my first 5-star read for the year. If you love an original, enigmatic protagonist, then Jane is the perfect character. A race against time in an atmospheric Australian setting, fighting a very real battle many women in our society face every day – which is perhaps one reason this book was so terrifying. Jinks is a talented writer, and I look forward to reading more of her books in future. Highly recommended!

Book Review: THE PAPER PALACE by Miranda Cowley Heller

 

Title: THE PAPER PALACE

Author:  Miranda Cowley Heller

Read: August 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description (Goodreads):

 

It is a perfect July morning, and Elle, a fifty-year-old happily married mother of three, awakens at "The Paper Palace"—the family summer place which she has visited every summer of her life. But this morning is different: last night Elle and her oldest friend Jonas crept out the back door into the darkness and had sex with each other for the first time, all while their spouses chatted away inside.

Now, over the next twenty-four hours, Elle will have to decide between the life she has made with her genuinely beloved husband, Peter, and the life she always imagined she would have had with her childhood love, Jonas, if a tragic event hadn't forever changed the course of their lives.

As Heller colors in the experiences that have led Elle to this day, we arrive at her ultimate decision with all its complexity. Tender yet devastating, The Paper Palace considers the tensions between desire and dignity, the legacies of abuse, and the crimes and misdemeanors of families.

My musings:

 

THE PAPER PALACE is a complex story about love in its many shapes and sizes: the sweet first love of youth, the enduring love of a happy marriage, the forbidden love between two people who have lost each other along the way and give in to the “what-could-have-been”. Taking place over the course of just 24-hours, the story explores what makes Elle, a fifty-something mother of three, cheat on her husband with her childhood sweetheart during a summer holiday in their family’s summer house. Don’t judge her to harshly, because by the end of the book you will understand the complex circumstances leading up to this fateful night.

I’m no longer sure what brought THE PAPER PALACE to my attention because I delved into it blindly without knowing anything about it, but I am so happy that it crossed my path – it was definitely one of my favourite books for 2024. Miranda Cowley Heller has a way of writing that brought the story and its characters to life for me, until I could picture it all as clearly as if I had lived in their midst.  If you usually shy away from romance, don’t dismiss this book quite yet, because this certainly wasn’t a happily-ever-after love story. Even the idyllic setting hinted of a darkness lurking, which wasn’t revealed until much later in the book and shook me to the core, as was intended. However, I love stories about family dynamics and dark secrets, and here the author’s keen observations about human nature offered a complex, well-told tale that kept me enthralled from beginning to end. 

It's final - DRUMROLL - my favourite for 2024 is: BLACK CAKE by Charmaine Wilkerson

 

Title: BLACK CAKE

Author:  Charmaine Wilkerson

Read: September 2024

My Rating: all the stars! 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

 

Book Description:

 

We can’t choose what we inherit. But can we choose who we become?

In present-day California, Eleanor Bennett’s death leaves behind a puzzling inheritance for her two children, Byron and Benny: a black cake, made from a family recipe with a long history, and a voice recording. In her message, Eleanor shares a tumultuous story about a headstrong young swimmer who escapes her island home under suspicion of murder. The heartbreaking tale Eleanor unfolds, the secrets she still holds back, and the mystery of a long-lost child challenge everything the siblings thought they knew about their lineage and themselves.

Can Byron and Benny reclaim their once-close relationship, piece together Eleanor’s true history, and fulfill her final request to “share the black cake when the time is right”? Will their mother’s revelations bring them back together or leave them feeling more lost than ever?

Charmaine Wilkerson’s debut novel is a story of how the inheritance of betrayals, secrets, memories, and even names can shape relationships and history. Deeply evocative and beautifully written, Black Cake is an extraordinary journey through the life of a family changed forever by the choices of its matriarch.

 

My musings:

 

Oh my aching heart! How I loved this book – such an emotional, well-written story about family and belonging, one I will remember for a long time to come. Reviews for favourite books are the hardest to write, but I will try to put into words how this story affected me. I will go as far as to say that it was my favourite book for 2024!

 

I love stories about family secrets and sibling relationships, so was instantly intrigued by Eleanor Bennett’s deathbed message to her children. Over an eight-hour recording, she confides aspects of her past that will change Byron and Benny’s lives in ways they could never have anticipated.

 

Wilkerson knows how to bring her characters to life, and it didn’t take long for them to worm their way into my mind and my heart. They all felt so real to me! There was so much to unwrap here: strong women, love, race, culture, belonging, sexuality, family dysfunction, and lots of secrets, all handled sensitively and with lots of heart. At the end, I felt happy and in tears at the same time, realising that these wonderful characters will stay in my mind for a while yet.

 

BLACK CAKE is a book to savour slowly and deliberately, getting to know the background of each character and what drives them. Like the cake the book is named after, this is a rich and flavoursome story steeped in love and a multitude of flavours that all blend together to form an amazing whole. Set against the atmospheric backdrop of a small Caribbean island, there was an element of armchair travel as well that made me want to jump on a plane and go there.

 

I’m really lost for words here – if only my heart could speak and express how much this book affected me. A truly wonderful story, very highly recommended!

New favourite for 2024: HERE ONE MOMENT by Liane Moriarty

 

Title: HERE ONE MOMENT

Author:  Liane Moriarty

Read: September 2024

Expected publication: out now

My Rating: all the stars! 🌠

 

Book Description (Goodreads):

 

If you knew your future, would you try to fight fate?

Aside from a delay, there will be no problems. The flight will be smooth, it will land safely. Everyone who gets on the plane will get off. But almost all of them will be forever changed.

Because on this ordinary, short, domestic flight, something extraordinary happens. People learn how and when they are going to die. For some, their death is far in the future—age 103!—and they laugh. But for six passengers, their predicted deaths are not far away at all.

How do they know this? There were ostensibly more interesting people on the flight (the bride and groom, the jittery, possibly famous woman, the giant Hemsworth-esque guy who looks like an off-duty superhero, the frazzled, gorgeous flight attendant) but none would become as famous as “The Death Lady.”

Not a single passenger or crew member will later recall noticing her board the plane. She wasn’t exceptionally old or young, rude or polite. She wasn’t drunk or nervous or pregnant. Her appearance and demeanor were unremarkable. But what she did on that flight was truly remarkable.

A few months later, one passenger dies exactly as she predicted. Then two more passengers die, again, as she said they would. Soon no one is thinking this is simply an entertaining story at a cocktail party.

If you were told you only had a certain amount of time left to live, would you do things differently? Would you try to dodge your destiny?

My musings:

 

I just finished reading and had to sit quietly for a little while to collect my thoughts on this heartfelt, poignant story. The thing I LOVE about Moriarty’s books is the way she makes me care about her characters, and HERE ONE MOMENT was a prime example. At work, I caught myself wanting to discuss Sue’s terrible predicted fate, and how Paula could possibly protect little Timmy, and that of course Leo would have to give up work immediately. I remembered just in time that these were just fictional characters, even if they felt so very real to me. At this point, I also want to give credit to Caroline Lee and Geraldine Hakewill for their brilliant audio narration!

 

For a book that heavily featured death and dying, it left me feeling warm and optimistic, even if there were many themes I will undoubtedly ponder for a while. Surely everyone has at one stage contemplated their own mortality, and the things that really matter in the big scheme of things. Perhaps it is a sign of growing up or ageing (or becoming a bit wiser and wearier) that we find it easier to focus on the things that are important to us, as the sand in our hourglass is steadily making its way down the tube. I know that this theme is not new, but what would you do if you knew how long you had to live? Would you change anything? How would you want to spend the time you had left?

 

Sometimes having to keep track of a multitude of characters can dilute their emotional significance, but not so here. I just LOVED these people and found myself caring very deeply about their fate. And as in a magic trick, Moriarty takes it one step further, slowly unveiling the identity of the “death lady” and the events that have led to those fateful hours on the delayed flight. As the novel was steadily nearing the end, I found myself fervently wishing to spend more time with these characters who I felt I knew so intimately by now. To be able to elicit such strong feelings for such a large group of people is proof of the skill of Moriarty’s writing. It offers just the right selection of snapshots out of everyone’s lives that let me fill in the rest and make these fictional characters appear real. I certainly felt like I knew everyone quite intimately by the time the story concluded.

 

I’m not sure what else I can say, except that I loved everything about this book. With just the right balance between intrigue and heart, and a multitude of themes relevant to our times (across a wide range of age groups, demographics and genders) it utterly captivated my attention. I feel that my words are inadequate to describe the book’s emotional impact on me and highly recommend it to anyone who has ever contemplated their own mortality. Such a wonderful, deep and touching read, a definite favourite for me!

Book Review: CHAI TIME AT CINNAMON GARDENS by Shankari Chandran

 

Title: CHAI TIME AT CINNAMON GARDENS

Author:  Shankari Chandran

Read: July 2024

Expected publication: out now

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description (Goodreads):

 

Welcome to Cinnamon Gardens, a home for those who are lost and the stories they treasure.

Cinnamon Gardens Nursing Home is nestled in the quiet suburb of Westgrove, Sydney – populated with residents with colourful histories, each with their own secrets, triumphs and failings. This is their safe place, an oasis of familiar delights – a beautiful garden, a busy kitchen and a bountiful recreation schedule.

But this ordinary neighbourhood is not without its prejudices. The serenity of Cinnamon Gardens is threatened by malignant forces more interested in what makes this refuge different rather than embracing the calm companionship that makes this place home to so many. As those who challenge the residents’ existence make their stand against the nursing home with devastating consequences, our characters are forced to reckon with a country divided.

Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens is about family and memory, community and race, but is ultimately a love letter to story-telling and how our stories shape who we are.

My musings:

 

CHAI TIME AT CINNAMON GARDENS is one of the best and most relevant books I have read so far this year! Don’t be fooled by the cosy cover and title, because this story is gritty and confronting in parts. It will touch your soul and break your heart.

Cinnamon Gardens is a nursing home, and if there is a similar place in real life, please sign me up! Started up by Sri Lankan immigrants, the place truly cares about its residents, taking not only their bodily needs but also their spiritual and cultural preferences into consideration. The food alone sounded divine, and the activities nurturing, provided by people who really care. I loved the concept so much! Exploring both the beginnings of the nursing home, going back into the early lives of its founders, as well as its current fate, was a journey I won’t soon forget.

The most difficult reviews are those of books that are so well written that my words will do them an injustice, and CHAI TIME AT CINNAMON GARDENS definitely falls into that category. Chandran manages to pack a lot of content into the book’s 384 pages, all relevant in Australia today. I learned so much about Sri Lankan culture and the country’s troubled history, and reflected on parallels drawn between its colonial history and Australia. The theme of the migrant experience and racism features prominently and also offered a unique angle from the author’s family’s own experience. I loved the way Chandran brought her characters to life, they all felt very real and dear to me.

CHAI TIME AT CINNAMON GARDENS was a bookclub choice, and there was so much to discuss! As stated before, my words feel totally inadequate summing up my reading experience and the reflection it prompted. I feel that everyone living in Australia today needs to read this book! It both warmed my heart and broke it and I shed many tears over the fates of its characters. Highly recommended!

 

Book Review: THE FROZEN RIVER by Ariel Lawhon

 

Title: THE FROZEN RIVER

Author:  Ariel Lawhon

Read: August 2024

Expected publication: out now

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description (Goodreads):

 

A gripping historical mystery inspired by the life and diary of Martha Ballard, a renowned 18th-century midwife who defied the legal system and wrote herself into American history.

Maine, 1789: When the Kennebec River freezes, entombing a man in the ice, Martha Ballard is summoned to examine the body and determine cause of death. As a midwife and healer, she is privy to much of what goes on behind closed doors in Hallowell. Her diary is a record of every birth and death, crime and debacle that unfolds in the close-knit community. Months earlier, Martha documented the details of an alleged rape committed by two of the town’s most respected gentlemen—one of whom has now been found dead in the ice. But when a local physician undermines her conclusion, declaring the death to be an accident, Martha is forced to investigate the shocking murder on her own.

Over the course of one winter, as the trial nears, and whispers and prejudices mount, Martha doggedly pursues the truth. Her diary soon lands at the center of the scandal, implicating those she loves, and compelling Martha to decide where her own loyalties lie.

My musings:

 

I love books based on real-life historical people, but not every author has the skill to imbue their fictional counterparts with as believable personalities as Lawhon has done with each and every one of her characters in THE FROZEN RIVER. For me, her book was like time travel back in time and place to meet midwife Martha Ballard as she is looking after the women in her small community in Maine. Of course, I knew that women of her time did not enjoy the same rights and freedom as we do today, but some of the historical facts still stunned me.

 

Based on the real Martha Ballard’s diary, which mainly recorded births and deaths and weather details, Lawhon blended fact and fiction to bring her own version of Martha and her large family to life. I liked her instantly, this intelligent, brave woman who will risk her own safety to fight for justice. Being a midwife, she is not only called upon to deliver babies but also to examine women who have been raped, or bodies when there has been an accident or a suspicious death. Martha is also able to read and write – not common for women of her time – and keeps a meticulous account of all her clients and events. When a man is found drowned in the river, she is the person called upon to determine what could have caused his accident. In Martha’s opinion, the death looks suspicious, with the man bearing wounds that point to a fight or an assault. She also knows that the same man had been accused of raping a local woman recently. But not everyone shares her opinion, and in a society where men have more power, this could prove to be very dangerous for her.

 

Thus starts a gripping mystery with a wonderfully atmospheric setting that had me spellbound from beginning to end – I could not get enough of this book! 

Book Review: THREE by Valerie Perrin

 

Title: THREE

Author:  Valerie Perrin

Read: April 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description:

 

From the international bestselling author of Fresh Water for Flowers, a beautifully told and suspenseful story about the ties that bind us and the choices that make us who we are.

1986: Adrien, Etienne and Nina are 10 years old when they meet at school and quickly become inseparable. They promise each other they will one day leave their provincial backwater, move to Paris, and never part.

2017: A car is pulled up from the bottom of the lake, a body inside. Virginie, a local journalist with an enigmatic past reports on the case while also reflecting on the relationship between the three friends, who were unusually close when younger but now no longer speak. . As Virginie moves closer to the surprising truth, relationships fray and others are formed.

Valérie Perrin has an unerring gift for delving into life. In Three, she brings readers along with her through a sequence of heart-wrenching events and revelations that span three decades. Three tells a moving story of love and loss, hope and grief, friendship and adversity, and of time as an ineluctable agent of change.

 

My musings:

 

Oh, my broken heart! What a wonderful story about love, friendship, grief and identity that touched my heart as deeply as FRESH WATER FOR FLOWERS (my first book by the author which had me coming back for more).

 

THREE is the story of three childhood friends who meet at school when they are ten years old and become inseparable. Do you recall those innocent days of childhood friendship, when your friends meant the world to you and became almost an extension of yourself, with the boundaries blurring between their thoughts and desires and your own? Nina, Etienne and Adrien are closer than siblings, sharing their thoughts, their dreams and their plans for the future, supporting each other through tough times. It is unimaginable to them that they would not continue to share their lives after school finishes. Their plan is to move to Paris, rent an apartment together and make music. But as it so often happens, life has other plans for them.

 

Now, thirty years later, the friends meet up again for the first time, reflecting on the past three decades of life, love, loss and shattered dreams – and trying to reconnect to the bond they shared as children.

 

THREE is a book that speaks to the heart, in every way. I loved reflecting on the meaning of friendship – how as children we are attracted to people in their purest form, without all the distractions we encounter later in life. Haven’t we all experienced this ourselves: we may not see some friends for decades and yet it seems as if we have only spoken yesterday. And yet, with others, we lose touch, grow apart, never find anything in common again, wondering what we ever saw in each other in the first place. As Nina, Etienne and Adrien fight their own battles thrown at them by life, we get to see them develop personalities quite unlike the innocent children who first forged a bond at school.

 

I loved every minute of this book, truly grieving the loss of these characters once I finished. Books like this don’t come around often, and yet Perrin has given me two memorable reads I will treasure and revisit when I want food for the soul and heart.  

Book Review: THE BELL IN THE LAKE and THE REINDEER HUNTERS by Lars Mytting

 

Every now and then you stumble across a book that just takes your breath away, and THE BELL IN THE LAKE and its sequel THE REINDEER HUNTERS fell into that category for me! I loved everything about this story, even though it also broke my heart into a million pieces.

 

Set in a small remote village in Norway in the late 1800’s, we get to meet the unforgettable characters that will soon worm their way into our hearts and minds. Astrid Hekne, the beautiful and clever daughter of a local landholder, who yearns to get out of the confines of her village and a different life. Kai Schweigaard, the young pastor who has just been posted to the village and has ambitious plans for the town, hoping that his progressive ideas will elevate his status and give him a ticket to grander locations. And Gerhard Schoenauer, the young German architect who has been sent to draw up plans of the church before it gets sold, dismantled and moved all the way to Germany. Butangen’s stave church features like a character itself, with its myth about the “sister bells” and its strong connection to the community, so it’s little wonder that its fate is strongly tied to that of its parishioners.

 

With a strong sense of place and time and a setting so vivid that I thought I was in Norway, the book took me on one unforgettable journey I only came out of reluctantly, dazed and completely emotionally wrung out. Mytting tells his tale so convincingly that his characters came to life for me, and I remember them as flesh and blood people whose fate touched me in ways only few fictional characters can. A heads up: have some tissues ready because I cried floods of tears!

 

Despite being 400 pages long, the story came to an end way too soon, but the good news was that there is a sequel! THE REINDEER HUNTERS takes the story up where THE BELL IN THE LAKE ended, with a new, younger generation of Butangen residents now in the forefront of the novel. Myttings trilogy (I can’t wait for the third instalment, which hasn’t been released yet) is deeply steeped in history and folklore, making it an interesting as well as educational read. Be prepared to spend hours googling “stave churches” after reading it. I was also fascinated by the details about midwifery and the knowledge of the midwives in the late 1900’s, with so many challenges to overcome, distance and poverty amongst them. Mytting’s keen observations of human behaviour fill his novels with tales of love & hate, jealousy & forgiveness, kindness and compassion and greed and the dynamics of a small remote community steeped in tradition and folklore. Here the progressive ideas of a young pastor may not be kindly received by all, and the ideas of the church often clash against more traditional views.

 

There is so much more I could say about these wonderful novels but I will leave it at that and urge you to pick them up for yourself. You will be rewarded with a story that will stay with you for a long time, and some magnificent armchair travel to Norway (which makes me want to go out and buy a ticket right now to explore it for myself). I can’t wait for the release of the third book in the trilogy to find out more about the fate of the sister bells and the sisters’ weaving depicting Skrapanatta.

Book Review: THE HALF MOON by Mary Beth Keane

 

Title: THE HALF MOON

Author:  Mary Beth Keane

Read: February 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

 

Book Description:

 

Malcolm Gephardt, handsome and gregarious longtime bartender at the Half Moon, has always dreamed of owning a bar. When his boss finally retires, Malcolm stretches to buy the place. He sees unquantifiable magic and potential in the Half Moon and hopes to transform it into a bigger success, but struggles to stay afloat.

His smart and confident wife, Jess, has devoted herself to her law career. After years of trying for a baby, she is facing the idea that motherhood may not be in the cards for her. Like Malcolm, she feels her youth beginning to slip away and wonders how to reshape her future.

Award-winning author Mary Beth Keane’s new novel takes place over the course of one week when Malcolm learns shocking news about Jess, a patron of the bar goes missing, and a blizzard hits the town of Gillam, trapping everyone in place. With a deft eye and generous spirit, Keane explores the disappointments and unexpected consolations of midlife, the many forms forgiveness can take, the complicated intimacy of small-town living, and what it means to be a family.

 

My musings:

 

This is my first book by Mary Beth Keane, and I absolutely loved the way she portrays the ups and downs of a marriage scarred by loss and thwarted aspirations. Jess and Malcolm once were the perfect couple – young, in love and full of hope they embarked on fulfilling their dreams. Jess threw herself into her law degree, whilst Malcolm still manages the Half Moon, the bar he once wants to own himself. Things are going well until one of their shared dreams falls through: that of starting their own family. After the loss of their infant daughter, their reality becomes endless rounds of fertility treatments and disappointments. When Malcolm makes a rash decision against Jess’ advice, the strain on the marriage proves too much and Jess leaves him.

 

Now, Malcolm is running the bar on his own, battening down the hatches just before a raging blizzard hits town. With the bar closed for a few days, Malcolm knows he won’t be able to pay his bills and faces the loss of his business, making him question every decision he has ever made ….

 

Keane is an astute observer of human relationships and her description of the couple’s marriage rang true and deeply touched my heartstrings. Here are two people who loved another, unmoored by tragedy. Will they find their way back to one another? Or is it already too late? The NOW part of the story plays out over just a week, but we get to find out all the details of what brought Jess and Malcolm to their present situations – I dare you not to shed a tear or two here!

 

THE HALF MOON was a touching, thought provoking, well written and wonderfully observed study of a marriage and what really matters in life, as well as one of overcoming adversity. I became so deeply engrossed in the audiobook that I just wanted to keep listening until I could find out how this story would play out. My first favourite read of the year – I now must go back and read the author’s other books!

Update: I have since read ASK AGAIN, YES by Mary Beth Keane and have found the same keen observations about human relationships as in THE HALF MOON. However, as a personal preference I much prefer novels that play out over a shorter time period to those who span whole lives, so THE HALF MOON remains my favourite.

Book Review: HAS ANYONE SEEN CHARLOTTE SALTER? by Nicci French

 

Title: HAS ANYONE SEEN CHARLOTTE SALTER?

Author:  Nicci French

Read: March 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description:

 

A nerve-tingling and atmospheric thriller from master of suspense Nicci French about two families shattered by tragedy and the secrets that have been waiting decades to be revealed.

 

On the day of Alec Salter’s fiftieth birthday party, just before Christmas 1990, his wife Charlotte vanishes. Most of the small English village of Glensted is at the party for hours before anyone realizes Charlotte is missing. While Alec brushes off her disappearance, their four children—especially fifteen-year-old Etty—grow increasingly anxious as the cold winter hours become days and she doesn’t return. When Charlotte’s coat is found by the river, they fear the worst.

 

Then the body of the Salters’ neighbor, Duncan Ackerley, is found floating in the river by his son Morgan and Etty. The police investigate and conclude that Duncan and Charlotte were having an affair before he killed her and committed suicide.

 

Thirty years later, Morgan Ackerley, a successful documentarian, has returned to Glensted with his older brother Greg to make podcast based on their shared tragedy with the Salters. Alec, stricken with dementia, is entering an elder care facility while Etty helps put his affairs in order. But as the Ackerleys ask to interview the Salters, the entire town gets caught up in the unresolved cases. Allegations are made, secrets are revealed, and a suspicious fire leads to a murder. With the podcast making national news, London sends Detective Inspector Maud O’Connor to Glensted to take over the investigation.

 

My musings:

 

It’s no secret that Nicci French are on my list of favourite writers, and I will snap up anything they write as soon as it comes out. So when I found out that HAS ANYONE SEEN CHARLOTTE SALTER? was available on audio, I settled in for a long and enjoyable read.

 

French are masters of characterisation and keen observers of the human psyche, a trait that made their latest book another 5-star read for me. It started off slowly, setting the scene: 15-year old Etty is the first to become alarmed when her mother fails to turn up for her husband’s 50^th birthday party. My alarm bells rang when everyone around her dismissed her fears as groundless, but when Charlotte Salter failed to appear after a few days, it became obvious that something was badly wrong here. Soon after, the body of the Salters’ neighbour and family friend is found dead in a nearby river. The police, eager to solve both cases, conclude that he must have taken his own life after feeling remorse for killing Charlotte. Case closed.

 

Thirty years later, the Salter children return to the family farm to clear out the house and organise for their father Alec, who is suffering from dementia, to go to a nursing home. Ever since their mother’s disappearance, the Salter children (now adults) have drifted apart, and even now refuse to open up about how Charlotte’s absence has affected them. It’s not until the two sons of the other victim decide to publish a podcast looking closer into the two deaths that they have to confront their past – with unexpected results.

 

HAS ANYONE SEEN CHARLOTTE SALTER? was a psychological thriller of the best kind. From the slow exploration of the two families’ grief and confusion, to the mystery surrounding Charlotte’s disappearance, this character driven tale kept me enthralled from beginning to end. In typical French fashion, nothing was as straight forward as it seemed, and there were plenty of surprises in store as we got a look into the past. I particularly loved how French describe the fallout of Charlotte’s disappearance on all her children, affecting their lives far into adulthood – especially Etty, whose personality has been totally transformed by grief.

 

As with most Nicci French novels, the story here had a deep emotional effect on me, and I still pondered the Salters’ story long after the book had concluded. Having lost my mother at a young age, I particularly related to the effect of grief on a young (and older) Etty.

 

Summary:

 

Lovers of slow burning, character driven mysteries will appreciate the way French unravel this cleverly constructed tale and their insight into the effects of crime on the victims’ families. One of my favourites so far this year!

 

Book Review: TOM LAKE by Ann Patchett

 

Title: TOM LAKE

Author:  Ann Patchett

Read: February 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description:

 

In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.

Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. As in all of her novels, Ann Patchett combines compelling narrative artistry with piercing insights into family dynamics. The result is a rich and luminous story, told with profound intelligence and emotional subtlety, that demonstrates once again why she is one of the most revered and acclaimed literary talents working today.

My musings:

 

Every now and then a book comes out of left field and totally steals your hear. TOM LAKE was that type of novel for me, jumping from a random book exchange find ("If I don't like it I just bring it back") to my first 5 star read of the year.

Set on a cherry orchard in those first few surreal early months of the pandemic, it tells the story of a family thrown together in lockdown, trying to make sense of the past and the present. I loved the concept of Lara telling her three grown daughters about her youth and musing about how her life was irrevocably changed by the events of one long ago summer. Tackling themes like first love, betrayal, friendship, dreams, loss and the choices we make, its underlying message is that life can turn in a heartbeat and derail the track we're on. Lara has long learned the wisdom some people never achieve: to see what's really important in the big picture and to live the moments. If there is one thing that the pandemic showed us, it's the importance of family and those little snatched joyful moments we often take for granted.

Just as Lara brings her character Emily to life, Pratchett presents us with a cast of unforgettable people who seemed as alive to me as someone I've known for years. Lara muses that she will grow too old to play Emily, and yet her fictional character spoke to me across the ages. I related as much to the younger Lara as to the mother telling her life story to her three grown daughters, trying to make them understand. Written with insight and a lot of heart, the story touched some deep sentimental core in me, making me feel warm and fuzzy one minute and sobbing my heart out the next. What a wonderful read this was! I am so sad to leave this story and am experiencing the biggest book hangover right now.

Book Review: TO THE RIVER by Vikki Wakefield

 

Title: TO THE RIVER

Author:  Vikki Wakefield

Read: March 2024

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 all the stars!

 

Book Description:

 

The Kelly family has always been trouble. When a fire in a remote caravan community kills nine people, including 17-year-old Sabine Kelly's mother and sister, Sabine confesses to the murders. Shortly after, she escapes custody and disappears. Recently made redundant from marriage, motherhood and her career, journalist Rachel Weirdermann has long suspected Sabine made her way back to the river-now, twelve years after the 'Caravan Murders', she has the time and the tenacity to corner a fugitive and land the story of the year.

Rachel's ambition lights the fuse leading to a brutal chain of events, and the web Sabine weaves will force Rachel to question everything she believes. Vikki Wakefield's compelling story is about class, corruption, love, loyalty, and the vindication of truth and justice. And a brave dog called Blue.

My musings:

 

After a somewhat disappointing start to my reading year, it came as a wonderful surprise to stumble across an unexpected gem, TO THE RIVER, a beautifully drawn story of resilience and justice despite disadvantage and corruption.

Sabine Kelly has been on the run from the law for 12 years after being accused of setting fire to a caravan park when she was only seventeen, killing nine people, including her own mother and sister. Journalist Rachel Weidermann has been fascinated by Sabine’s story since she first read about it and has been tirelessly investigating Sabine’s fate in the hopes of locating her and being able to write an expose’ that will save her flailing career. Through a weird twist of fate, Rachel and Sabine meet, setting a chain of events into motion that will put them both in danger.

I loved Sabine from the start, despite her murderous reputation, and my heart broke for her as we get to find out more about her childhood and years on the run. Rachel was initially a bit more difficult to warm to, but in the end she won me over as well. Wakefield writes with insight and a lot of heart, which shines through in all her characters. Each and every one of them (including Blue, the blue heeler) quickly took on shape in my head until they felt like real flesh and blood people as familiar to me as old friends. Further complimented by the backdrop of an atmospheric river and small town setting, the story soon swept me up and kept me captivated until the end, and I was sad to turn the last page and lose the connection to characters that had become very dear to me in the process of reading.

TO THE RIVER was the first book I have read by Vikki Wakefield but it won’t be my last – I just loved her writing style and the way she portrayed her characters. It’s always exciting to discover a new author to love, and I look forward to reading many more of her novels in future.