Other Worlds

Other Worlds

by Barbara Michaels

Severely Edited Blurb:

In a London Club, Houdini, Conan Doyle, and other psychic investigators and debunkers gather to tell ghost stories. Their purpose is to tell the tale, and then each will pick it apart to try to find an explanation for the phenomenon in question. The first story is one of the most famous historical hauntings in U.S. history: the Bell Witch in Tennessee. The second is a moderately well-known haunting in Stratford, Connecticut, called, appropriately, the Stratford Haunting. Each tale is told, and then the guests gather around the club describe their understanding of whether the hauntings are either fake or very real.

My Reaction:

Well, the title (Other Worlds) certainly sounds like it could be creepy and interesting and typical of a Barbara Michaels gothic thriller.  The reality, unfortunately, is nothing like her usual tales.  I'm sorry, but I found it dry and dull.  I recognize the Bell Witch, so I don't expect a satisfying conclusion-- or indeed, anything from this retelling to be worth this slog... I just can't.  Not right now.  Maybe I'll pick it up again at a later date, but for now, it's a DNF!  I stopped 15% of the way through.  On to greener pastures! 

(Incidentally, this is the second DNF I have for this author.  With the other one, Smoke and Mirrors, I think I quit after the first page or two, because something annoyed me, I peeked at a few reviews, and I had my suspicions confirmed.  Political plot?  Heavy on the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil"?  Oh, good grief!  No, thanks.  Life's too short.)

The Hunting Party

The Hunting Party

by Lucy Foley

Severely Edited Blurb:

A group of thirtysomething friends from Oxford meet to welcome in the New Year together, a tradition they began as students ten years ago. For this vacation, they’ve chosen an idyllic and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands—the perfect place to get away and unwind by themselves.  However, after a decade, the weight of secret resentments has grown too heavy for the group’s tenuous nostalgia to bear.

By dawn on New Year's Day, a blizzard has shut the lodge off from the rest of the world-- and one of the group has been murdered.

Keep your friends close, the old adage goes. But just how close is too close?

My Reaction:
I always want to like this kind of book-- just mindless "thriller" entertainment-- but sometimes they disappoint, and it's rare that one is anything particularly special.  More often than not, they don't live up to expectations.  Characters do things that don't make sense, and frequently the characters themselves are all so horrible that I don't care what happens to them, one way or the other!  That was definitely the case with this one.  

I'm not sure what I think about the format of the book... It's a fairly large cast, and it took me a while to get all the characters straight in my head.  Then there's the fact that not only does the POV shift among a handful of characters from chapter to chapter, but we toggle back and forth in time between before and after the murder-- and yet we're not explicitly told/shown who the murder victim is until rather late in the novel.  By that point, I'd long since sussed out the identity of not only the victim, but also the murderer!

Everything was dragged out longer than it needed to be, and some "twists"/red herrings or minor mysteries about characters' backstories were needlessly, endlessly teased.  Practically everything that was supposed to be a surprise failed to do so.  More than a bit cliché and predictable.  

Maybe it's a nit-picky thing, but it drove me crazy when the author repeatedly used question marks incorrectly.  If it's not a question, it doesn't get a question mark!  Or have the rules of grammar and punctuation changed since the last time I took an English class?  Where was the editor? 

To top it all off, the epilogue hits you with something that makes no sense.  To avoid spoilers, let's just say that the murderer apparently doesn't even face trial for all of the crimes s/he committed in this book!  To be honest, I didn't initially notice that myself-- just reeling from the onslaught of cliché after cliché, really-- but after skimming a few other reviews, I saw it mentioned and realized that those reviewers were correct.  Very strange!  It's a huge, glaring error of that type that makes you question, again, what the editor was thinking.  

Meh. 

Golden Urchin

Golden Urchin 

by Madeleine Brent

Blurb:

Mitji lived with the Aboriginal tribe for as long as she could remember, but with her white skin, thin nose, and red hair, she does not look like the rest of the tribe.  As she nears womanhood, her oddness has made her an outcast and she must leave her people. She goes on a walkabout, in search of the walypalya, the tribe with red hair and white skin like her own, who had come from the great waters— perhaps they would receive her kindly and let her stay with them. On her wanderings she comes upon a white man, lying half-dead in the blazing heat, and nurses him back to health. Together they made their way to his home. There, Mitji becomes known as Meg and comes to understand that she is herself one of the walypalya. There are new dangers amongst this tribe, and Meg must confront the terrors of a long sea voyage before she can find happiness on the other side of the world. Only the knowledge gained from her Aboriginal tribe can guarantee her survival and that of her friends.

My Reaction:

Golden Urchin is a fascinating, well-written escapist adventure with excellent pacing and a truly heroic heroine.  I knocked my rating down down half a star to 4.5 (and round down, since half-stars aren't available on Goodreads) because I felt there was room for improvement in the romance department, and it wasn't quite a five-star book for me, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Madeleine Brent does it again!

Mitji/Meg's adventures are endlessly interesting to read, especially when she's surviving in the wilds of Australia and Africa.  Of course, I have no idea how realistic some of this information is... For instance, I've watched survival shows and seen people get terribly ill from suddenly switching to a diet of only meat, so I'm curious how certain things in this book would actually have worked out.  I also have my doubts that a naturally very fair-skinned person can somehow become more or less sunburn-proof, just through exposure to sun as a child.  It was still fun, though, and as long as you read it as escapist literature and not a survival guide, none of that matters.

Yes, it's predictable in many ways.  It has a formula to follow, but it does so in such a way that it still holds your attention.  To be honest, I don't mind a certain amount of "formula".  You know (in broad strokes) what to expect, and that can be comforting.  Even if I know the general direction the story's headed, I'm interested in exactly how it will get there, and the book is the journey to that destination, not merely the ending itself.  

Mitji/Meg is sometimes almost too perfect, but I never found her version of "a little too good to be true" annoying enough to want to stop reading.  I like her best as "Mitji"; she's especially captivating in the early chapters.

The romance... Well, I don't want to venture into spoilers, but it's just not to my tastes, unfortunately.  I seem to remember that the romance in Moonraker's Bride was better, and I think I liked that book better, over all, but Golden Urchin is a wonderful adventure and tale of survival.  I'm glad to have more novels by Madeleine Brent yet to read for the first time.

The Wife and the Widow

The Wife and the Widow

by Christian White

Blurb:

Set against the backdrop of an eerie island town in the dead of winter, The Wife and The Widow is an unsettling thriller told from two perspectives: Kate, a widow whose grief is compounded by what she learns about her dead husband’s secret life; and Abby, an island local whose world is turned upside when she’s forced to confront the evidence of her husband’s guilt. But nothing on this island is quite as it seems, and only when these women come together can they discover the whole story about the men in their lives. Brilliant and beguiling, The Wife and The Widow takes you to a cliff edge and asks the question: how well do we really know the people we love?

My Reaction:

I chose this novel after reading that it had an amazing, unusual twist.  Well, who doesn't love a good twist?!  (...pointedly ignoring people who claim not to love twists...)

To give credit where it's due, there is a surprising twist.  Unlike the person who recommended this book, I don't know that I'd go so far as to say that I've never seen that type of twist before, but it was still unexpected.  

The problem is that I didn't enjoy most of the book.  It was difficult to care much about most of these bland characters, and while I understood their motivations, I found those motivations irritating and unsympathetic, and the whole thing left me cold.  Slightly annoyed, mostly cold.  


SPOILER-Filled Tidbits:

--  The scene between the two teens in the old ferry terminal... Sorry, not what I want to read.  Not by a long shot.

--  John is an idiot.  Why go back and speak to Abby and Eddie about his decision to come forward?  He says he's already decided what he's going to do, with or without them.  He had to know that there was some risk involved.  Abby practically threatened him, even back when he was a teenager.  Did he really think it was a good idea to tell her his intentions and then meet the two of them (as he thought he was doing) in an isolated spot?  What real difference would it have made, talking to them first?  If he'd made up his mind to go to the police, he should've just done it!  But you know what?  Who cares?!  Does any reader honestly care that John was killed?   

--  Never heard of a "she-oak" before this.  Sounds kind of funny, like a folksy way of saying a female oak, if some oaks were male and others female (which apparently they aren't).  "Observe the maternal instinct at work as this she-oak provides a sheltering canopy to protect her precious saplings..."

--  Abby and Ray's discussion just prior to his "confession"... First, she tells him why she can't believe he killed someone, and her reasons include such gems as "because I once saw you weep without shame during an airline ad" and "I've seen you add lavender oil to your bathwater".  Oh, and the dude has been known to laugh insanely at Funniest Home Videos.  (Well, he's human, isn't he?!)  So someone who enjoys the scent of lavender can't possibly be a killer, I guess.  (Again, doesn't almost everyone like lavender?)  To tell the truth, if I see someone weeping without shame during an airline ad, that might be enough to make me doubt their emotional stability!  I'm not saying it's a red flag for murdering tendencies, but it certainly would raise an eyebrow.  

--  During the same conversation as above, Ray admits that he's been worrying that he's unable to provide enough for his family, feels that he's barely keeping his head above water, and sometimes fantasizes about escaping to a different life.  Relatable enough.  Abby asks why he hasn't ever talked to her about those feelings, and he replies, "Come on, Abby, I'm not one of your girlfriends. ... Men aren't like that."  UGH.  (eyeroll, etc., etc.)  Good grief.  I'm really struggling to reconcile Manly-Man Ray who can't talk to his own wife and Touchy-Feeling Ray who enjoys a lavender bath and weeps at sappy commercials.  

--  I'm not a parent, and some people insist that anyone who isn't a parent is incapable of using imagination or the powers of observation to get even the faintest grasp of what it is to be a parent, but working with just the feeble understanding I do possess (another eyeroll for you, here), I can't agree with Ray and Abby's decision to protect their creepy son Eddie from the repercussions of his actions.  Eddie was young.  He was scared.  There was a witness (John) who would have testified to the fact that that man had come in and basically threatened them.  The victim wasn't entirely innocent, and as a minor, Eddie could have been okay.  It's not as though he went on to live a rich, fulfilling life with the knowledge of his guilt hanging over his head, anyway.  Imagine knowing that your parent took the fall for you, at the cost of decades of freedom... It would be crushing.  How could you live with that guilt, even aside from the guilt of the crime you committed?

(Interesting that both this book and the one I last read involved an adult character taking the fall for a crime committed by a younger relative...)  

The Turn of the Key

The Turn of the Key

by Ruth Ware

(Edited) Blurb:

When Rowan Caine applies for a dream position as a nanny, it seems too good to be true.  She's smitten with Heatherbrae House-- by the luxurious “smart” home fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family.

What she doesn’t know is that she’s stepping into a nightmare-- one that will end with a child dead and herself in prison awaiting trial for murder.  How can she explain the eerie, sinister events that led to this tragedy when she doesn't understand them herself?  She has only herself to rely on as she attempts to untangle the mystery and prove that she is innocent of a terrible crime.

My Reaction:

This novel gets a split ranking from me.  Despite some nitpicks, I'd give the bulk of the book a solid 3.5 or 4 stars for enjoyment value.  The ending, unfortunately, is disappointingly vague and abrupt.  I guess an overall rating of 3 seems fair, but if you can't stand ambiguous endings, give this a pass! 

(Based on some information the author shared with fans after her book's publication, using the process of elimination, you can probably make a decent guess about the main character's fate, but I still found it a dissatisfying conclusion to read.)


Nitpicks (with many, many SPOILERS):
-- I couldn't believe the length of the section of Rowan figuring out how to operate the shower.  Her difficulties with the control panels in general are a little dull and repetitious, and her embarrassment over speaking instructions to "Happy" is slightly absurd.  Was Alexa really that new-fangled in 2017? ...Okay, I looked it up, and Alexa's general release was in mid-2015.  Yes, maybe it feels a little strange to speak to a computer the first few times, but I still think it's overplayed in this novel.  It's not that embarrassing to do, especially when there's no-one else around.  

--  Another example of the above: "Was I going insane, talking aloud to a household appliance?"  Yes, Rowan, your marbles are well and truly lost.  Hey, I talk to appliances and other inanimate objects all the time, and they aren't even "smart".  I'm a little quirky, but definitely not insane.  (I am, however, irritated by the boring trope of "Oh, gosh, you must be mad, talking to yourself!")

-- There's a silly scene where Rowan removes her blouse to clean off some oatmeal, and the handyman accidentally walks in on her and sees her topless.  As in completely topless.  But... Would any woman really attend an interview for a nannying position wearing a thin silk blouse and no bra?!  It's just a weird fashion choice.  It was totally unnecessary, too, because surely it would be embarrassing to have a stranger unexpectedly see you in just your bra.  Wouldn't that be enough?  

-- At some point, I forgot that all of this is supposed to be a letter Rowan is writing from prison to a lawyer she hopes to convince to represent her in her murder trial.  When she next addressed him by name, it was jarring.  I'm familiar with this type of framing device-- and a certain amount of this type of thing is only to be expected-- but it is rather awkward and ridiculous when a character somehow remembers entire conversations from weeks/months ago and includes tedious, irrelevant events in detail.  This doesn't feel like a letter.  (The long account of her attempt to have a shower becomes even more bizarre when you consider that she wrote all of that to the lawyer!)

-- It requires a powerful suspension of disbelief to accept that Sandra, the doting and tech-savvy mother, would not Google her prospective nanny and scope out her social media.  I guess she just trusted the background check and references, but it's odd.  Teenaged Rhiannon managed to suss out the truth easily enough, and it doesn't seem like it was that difficult to realize that something didn't add up.  Rowan/Rachel's take on the situation?  "But truthfully, it had never occurred to me that anyone would join the dots so assiduously."  Hm.  

-- Ugh, the sex scene as written by Rowan/Rachel to the lawyer... So, so embarrassing!  "--I can't write this to you.  I can't write this but I can't stop remembering it.  I don't know how to stop."  Ow, the cringing!  Just write, "One thing led to another, and yada yada yada, I got up and left after he fell asleep."  

--  I have to admit, I never saw the major twists coming.  Definitely didn't guess that Bill was Rowan/Rachel's father, and it never crossed my mind that she was lying about her identity, either.  I assumed that Maddie fell off the roof while on her way to the window to the attic, so I didn't get that quite right, either.  

--  Call me callous, but it didn't make sense for Rowan/Rachel to keep Ellie's secret.  Ellie is a child.  She wouldn't be punished, as such.  Instead, she'd get some much-needed help and therapy.  Her life wouldn't be ruined any more than it already will be.  She knows what she did-- there's no escaping that-- and when she's old enough, she'll realize that it was also her fault that Rowan/Rachel went to prison and could have been convicted of a crime she didn't commit.  

--  Would it really be possible for Ellie's letter to reach Rowan/Rachel sealed and unread?  Don't they screen prisoners' mail?  Argh!  If that's the case, this ending makes no sense!  (And that's basically how I feel about the ending, in a nutshell.  It makes no sense.  Oh well!)