Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) by Jesse Q. Sutanto

April 17, 2025

Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) by Jesse Q. Sutanto

Vera Wong - Chinese mother, tea house proprietor, and amateur sleuth - is back for another adventure. Life has been good for Vera since she solved the murder of the dead man in her tea shop. Business has been brisk, Vera has a new group of friends, and her son has a girlfriend. But in the midst of all this good fortune, Vera finds herself secretly bored. While she doesn't really want to see anyone get murdered, she feels she has a knack for collecting information (and people) and solving mysteries. So when a social media influencer disappears and an unidentified body is found, Vera just knows she can find the answer to both mysteries.

The sequel to Vera Wong's Guide to Murder, with a new cast of strangers who become friends added to the group that Vera collected in the first book. Vera learns about social media and influencers, posting videos of herself cooking and making tea while solving the problems of her new friends. Funny and heartwarming, recommended for readers of cozy mysteries who enjoy their mysteries with more humor and less romance than most cozies.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

What I imagine Vera's tea shop must look like

Jane and Dan at the End of the World by Colleen Oakley

April 10, 2025

Jane and Dan at the End of the World by Colleen Oakley

Dan scores a reservation at the exclusive La Fin du Monde restaurant and takes his wife Jane to celebrate their wedding anniversary. But his timing is off, since Jane has decided that she is going to ask for a divorce over dinner (also maybe not the best timing). Not to mention that climate change activists have chosen that night to bomb the restaurant.

Quirky and fun, with a long-term marriage that turns out to be a romance after all. Recommended for readers who enjoy off-beat fiction like Nothing to See Here or Zero Stars, Do Not Recommend.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review. 

The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson

April 8, 2025

The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson

An examination of the five months between Abraham Lincoln's election and the start of the Civil War. I have enjoyed Larson's other books a great deal, but for me, this one didn't measure up to his earlier works. I think the sheer volume of research and the number of characters causes the narrative to bog down. Normally Larson's books are gripping page turners, but I had to work to finish this one.

 

Atomic Habits by James Clear

April 7, 2025

Atomic Habits by James Clear

Everyone can think of behaviors they would like to become a habit, as well as existing habits they’d like to break. It’s not like we don’t know what we should or shouldn’t do (I think most people know that smoking bad for their health, and that eating fast food every day isn’t good on a number of levels). James Clear tells us that it’s not that we are weak or have no self-control, it’s that we are using the wrong system. His method is based on tiny changes, improving 1% at a time, resulting in huge cumulative change. Much of his plan is based on our identity, how we think of ourselves or the person that we want to be. He details an innovative four-step system for creating new habits and shedding bad habits, different than the usual repeat-an-action-for-30-days-to-create-a-habit plan. 

Glamorous Notions by Megan Chance

March 27, 2025

Glamorous Notions by Megan Chance

Elsie Gruner escaped her family’s hog farm in rural Ohio by eloping with an aspiring actor. They travel across the country to Hollywood, earning money by hustling players at pool halls. When they arrive in Hollywood, Elsie takes a job in a cafe while her husband Walt struggles to break into the movies. But Walt is just a hustler, a mediocre actor who only gets small parts. Elsie dreams of being a dress designer and she gets her chance  when she wins an internship to an American art school in Rome. But Elsie is soon swept up in a dangerous game that threatens to end her budding career almost before it starts.

The 1950s are one of my least favorite eras to read about, because of the paranoia, the persecution, and the super-rigid morality. Anyone who wasn’t mainstream was wrong - if you associated with anyone who had subversive views, your job and your future could be in serious trouble. Gossip could ruin your life. Elsie/Lena, the main character, is extremely naive and is caught up first by a con man and later by a spy ring. A little too much description of costumes and studio in-fighting and name dropping, which made the narrative drag. Disappointing, not as good as the author’s earlier books. 

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

Film studio circa 1950

The Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict

March 20, 2025

The Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict

In order to gain the respect of their male counterparts, five female mystery writers from the Golden Age of mystery - Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Emma Orzcy, Margery Allingham, and Ngaio Marsh - join forces to solve the mystery of a young English nurse found murdered in Boulogne. 

Disappointing. Loosely based on an event in Dorothy Sayers' life. I usually really enjoy the author’s books but this one was slow moving, and the mystery itself was not compelling. Usually Benedict writes about real women who worked in areas that were normally reserved for men, and yes, the five women writers had to fight against sexism just to get their books published, let alone be accepted by their male peers. But unlike her previous books, I didn’t learn much about the characters’ lives. I guess I expected more from a story about the five major women mystery writers of the Golden Age - there were a lot of descriptions of where they were having high tea and shopping, and what they were eating and wearing (don’t get me wrong, I love a high tea). They just didn’t seem as sharp or clever as a mystery author should be, and Dorothy seemed like she was constantly prodding them along. Loved the cover, although it reminded me of Laurie Notaro’s The Murderess. 

Many thanks to Edelweiss for providing an eARC for review.

Dorothy Sayers

Lone Women by Victor Lavalle

March 19, 2025

Lone Women by Victor Lavalle

Montana 1915: Adelaide Henry is a "lone woman," a single woman who purchases a plot of land and becomes a homesteader. She leaves everything behind in California, especially her family, her sins, and her past, travelling only with a large heavy steamer trunk. She purchases a desolate plot far away from any neighbors, yet they find her anyway, and Adelaide gradually becomes part of a community. She soon realizes that many people come to Montana to escape the past and start over. Yet Adelaide is hiding something far worse than most of the and when her secret comes out, people start to disappear.

Genre blending fiction, part well-research historical fiction, part horror. Good descriptions of survival on a lonely homestead near a small town. In the early 20th century, Montana was one of the few places where a single woman could own land and homestead without a man to co-sign for them - even Black women like Adelaide could own land. Like others, I kept reading to find out what was in the trunk. A look at the American frontier like you've never seen it before, a suitable if unusual choice for Women's History Month.

Montana homestead, 1915