The Answer is No by Fredrik Backman

December 21, 2024

The Answer is No by Fredrik Backman

Lucas lives a happy life. He lives alone, works from home, enjoys pizza and a glass of good red wine, and plays video games. His secret to happiness: just say no. When other people want you to do something, either politely refuse or just ignore them. He has no interest in changing his life, and it's a great system until someone in his apartment complex discards an old skillet next to the garbage dumpster, and then the trouble begins.

A short story by the author of A Man Called Ove, filled with Backman's signature humorous view of the human race. Enjoyable.

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

And yes, pad thai should have peanuts in it.

Close to Death by Anthony Horowitz

April 22, 2024

Close to Death by Anthony Horowitz

Anthony receives a call from his agent, asking him to write another mystery about Daniel Hawthorne, to be ready for release in in time for the Christmas sales. The only problem is, Hawthorne doesn't have a current case that he is working on. Anthony's agent suggests to them that Anthony should write a book about one of Hawthorne's old cases that happened five years earlier. Even though Hawthorne agrees and chooses the case, he seem reluctant to have Anthony write the book, doling out his notes a bit at a time.

The fifth book in the Horowitz and Hawthorne series, with the usual complex plot. This was one of the less successful titles in the series. The plot is a locked-room type of mystery, with the victim and the killer both living in the same gated community. However, there are some holes in the methodology. Anthony complains that he is having a hard time writing the book since he doesn't know how it ends, which doesn't make sense since the case took place five years earlier. It was quite sensational and received loads of media coverage, so it seems he could have looked up the details online. He does an online search for and finds things like information about the obscure organization that employs Hawthorne as well as contact information on another of Hawthorne's cases with only the person's last name. I hope the next book is better.

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

Richmond, the setting of this mystery

Nosy Neighbors by Freya Sampson

April 12, 2024

Nosy Neighbors by Freya Sampson

Shelley House in the village of Chalcot is a down-at-heel former grand mansion that has been subdivided into six flats. The tenants are the usual mix: the nosy older woman who keeps track of all the comings and goings, the retiree who takes in lodgers to help make ends meet, the single woman with perpetually bad taste in men, the menacing man with a menacing dog, the financially-strapped widower and his teenaged daughter, and the party boy who smokes week, throws frequent parties, plays his music way too loud, and leaves bags of trash in the hallway. They co-exist until they all receive an eviction notice from the building's owner.

Neighbors are a mixed blessing. On the positive side, they're close by - in an emergency, they are frequently the first ones to help, On the down side, they're close by - they know what you're doing, all the time. (I once had upstairs neighbors that I swore stomped around in wooden clogs on bare floors, 24/7.) Reminded me of Fredrik Backman's A Man Called Ove, with its quirky characters and themes of forgiveness, redemption, letting go of the past, and finding love in unexpected places. This is not actually a mystery, and the plot was somewhat predictable. Reggie the terrier was by far my favorite character. Recommended to readers looking for a heartwarming, feel-good read. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

Traditional English village

Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane

July 27, 2019

Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane

Francis Gleeson and Brian Stanhope met at the police academy and were rookie cops together.  They weren’t particularly close friends, but end up being neighbors in the New York suburb of Gillam.  Their children grow up together and the youngest two, Kate and Peter, become best friends.  But Brian’s wife Anne is mentally unstable, and when she commits a violent act, the two families are bound together forever.

In hindsight (which is always 20/20), several of the characters realize that they should have seen a tragedy approaching.  There is also a hint of Romeo-and-Juliet, when forbidden lovers Kate and Peter find each other again years later.  As the years pass, several of the characters come to realize that the people they demonized, are just regular people with their good and bad points, and that mental illness is just that, an illness.

Uncle George is somewhat overlooked in all the drama between the two families, but he is actually a wonderful character, the guy who always manages to show up when you need him, no matter what is going on in his life.  He is a hard-working man who takes on his brother’s responsibilities and makes major changes to his life without complaining (Peter realizes that his uncle was only around 30 when he took him in and raised him).  

Overall, I enjoyed the novel but there were a few things I would have changed.  I would have liked to hear from Lena (Francis’s long-suffering wife) about how she felt over the years.  Some episodes are over-explained and got a little long (yeah, the Stanhopes are genetically prone to alcoholism, we got it, no need to explain more).  Less teen-aged angst would have been okay, too.  The ending was a little unsatisfying.  I’m not sure what I was expecting but like a lot of literary fiction, the book sort of just stops when one of the characters realizes that they are all just fine.