The Only One Left

The Only One Left

by Riley Sager

(Really Long) Blurb:

At seventeen, Lenora Hope

Hung her sister with a rope

Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.

Stabbed her father with a knife

Took her mother’s happy life

It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer—I want to tell you everything.

“It wasn’t me,” Lenora said

But she’s the only one not dead

As Kit helps Lenora write about the events leading to the Hope family massacre, it becomes clear there’s more to the tale than people know. But when new details about her predecessor’s departure come to light, Kit starts to suspect Lenora might not be telling the complete truth—and that the seemingly harmless woman in her care could be far more dangerous than she first thought.

My Reaction:

I was really into this in the early chapters.  It was checking all the boxes for a fun, old-fashioned murder-mystery thriller.  I loved the setting.  Early 80s?  Yes, take me back to the nostalgia-rich aesthetic and music of my childhood!  A once grand but now decaying mansion perched dramatically on the edge of a cliff? Sounds amazing.  A small cast of characters in (relative) isolation and a mystery to untangle?  That's the good stuff!  

After finding Children of the Sun such a long, repetitive, frustrating slog of a read, this felt like it cracked along at a good pace.  I actually looked forward to reading more!  (What a novelty!)   Yes, I had some quibbles here and there (and there was an recurring element involving serious illness that was crucial to the plot yet still not a topic I want to read about), but overall, it was fun.  

The story started to drag after a while, and I could sense that I wasn't going to love the ending.  And then the ending came, and I was proven right.  That ending.  Phew.  I've read books by this author before, but my memory being what it is, thrillers all tend to blur together, so I don't know if all his books are like this, but, man, based on this book alone, the guy must love himself a twist.  I mean, I like a good twist, myself, and I understand the pressure on authors today to provide something unexpected, but I think this author may be unhealthily addicted to twists—so much so that the end of this book felt like one twist too many.  

See, here's the thing:  The actions of the characters kind of need to make sense.  Well, they need to make sense for me to truly enjoy the book, that is.  And this one... Eh, there are some things that just don't add up.  A lot of that you can just shrug and choose to let go.  (Don't think so hard!  This is suppose to be fun! It's a mystery novel, not a history textbook!) But sometimes authors simply push too far, ask us to turn off our brains a little too much, and thereby spoil the book. So while I did enjoy reading the earlier parts of this book, I have to knock off some stars for the sheer nope-don't-believe-it-ness of the story.  

I'd recommend it to people who don't care too much about maintaining some semblance of realism in their reading.  I don't regret reading this, but it did go too far with the twists, in my opinion, and unfortunately that made it a less satisfying read.  

Want to know about the too-far twist?  Don't mind spoilers?  Ok, don't say I didn't warn you...

SPOILERS 

WILL

FOLLOW:

Ok.  Well, there are other reviews that list all the many, many quibbles I had with the book, so I guess I needn't go into too much detail here.  Some of the twists didn't make total sense to me—If I recall correctly, Jessie just (temporarily) abandoned her recently discovered grandmother in a house that was about to literally fall into the sea, where her friend had recently been murdered?—but whatever.  I'll let it go.  

The one that was just a bridge too far was the final reveal that Virginia has been faking her paralysis for decades.  (I think I got that right.  It was decades, correct?)  At some point she realizes that she can move and speak, but rather than letting anyone know, she keeps it a secret (from even her best friend who sacrificed everything to stay at her side), rehabilitates herself without any assistance, and pretends to be unable to move anything but her left hand. (No-one notices that her withered limbs are gaining muscle, so just put that thought right out of your pretty little head.) Yes, that means she has to sit perfectly still all day, every day and stay captive indoors when she just wants to go outside.  Yes, that means she has to eat food that sounds absolutely revolting—soft, mushy stuff with pills crushed into it.  (Have you ever tried to take even a simple pain reliever crushed into a spoonful of jam?  It's disgusting.  I can only hope that Virginia's meds were magically flavorless, but I doubt it!) And yes, pretending to be nearly completely paralyzed means she must wear adult diapers, with everything that goes along with that.  She's apparently fine with it!  Personally, I think that part of the book is insulting to people who actually are paralyzed or otherwise unable to care for themselves.  I can't honestly imagine anyone would choose to endure all that if they had a better option. 

Anyway.  I think that's just nuts.  Unless Virginia herself were nuts... But she's not!  She's sharp as a tack.  So no, I don't think it's believable that she'd continue to choose to live that way for years and decades.  Oh, something else just occurred to me!  When Kit's father comes to kill Virginia—and when the house begins to collapse—she still keeps up the act!  Now that is commitment.  She'd rather be murdered or killed in a landslide than let anyone know she can move.  Amazing.  

Children of the Sun

Children of the Sun

by Beth Lewis

Blurb:

Summer 1982. Deep in the Adirondack Mountains, over three hundred people live off-grid in a secret community. Atlas is a refuge for broken souls who long for a different life. Founded by the enigmatic Sol, the group now prepares for their final ceremony: the opening of the Golden Door. They believe they will cross to another world, to a new life where their past decisions never ended in tragedy.

James Morrow is a rookie New York City reporter intent on making his name with an exposé of the crazy cult in the woods. He secures an invitation to the camp on the condition he tell the world of its wonders, but James is a sceptic. He's sure there must be more to the mysterious leader and his endgame than his followers have signed up for.

James soon finds there is a darker side to the cult beyond the prayers and yellow robes. A group of children are treated like gods, there are iron strips embedded in the earth, and nobody talks about what's behind the gates of Sol's private sanctuary. As James learns the stories of the members and how they came to be there, he begins to understand the desperate nature of their beliefs - a desperation he knows all too well.

As the final ceremony draws near, James must ask himself: what will it cost them to reach this other life? And is that a price he's willing to pay?

My Reaction:

I've had varying responses to some of this author's previous works.  I enjoyed The Wolf Road, but found Bitter Sun so unpleasant that I didn't finish it (though did later do so much skimming of the end just to see how it ended that I probably might as well have done so).  This one falls right in the middle.  It's much better than Bitter Sun, but I couldn't say I enjoyed the reading experience.  

The idea at the center of the book is interesting, but I found the story too drawn out.  Maybe part of the issue is that there are three narrators; switching point of view can be an effective literary device, but it has to be used with care, because all too often it seems to bog things down. Just when you get into one thread of the story, perspective shifts, and you lose momentum (or at least I do)—and many times there's one perspective that's more interesting to read, and you find yourself resenting the shift back to the "boring" narrator. 

Another problem (for me) was the back-and-forth and round-and-round of the narrators' internal monologues as they try to figure things out.  Do they think the other character is bad or good—insane or a genius?  Some of that may be just part of maintaining the mystery until the end, but at a certain point I stop caring and just want it to end.  Characters who talk or think in endless circles are so frustrating to read!  Ultimately, it could have been improved by a more ruthless editor.  

Little Nit-Picks (with SPOILERS):

• Do we ever find out what happened to the child in the Florida camp?  I guess it was an early experiment that went wrong?  I don't recall if it was ever explained at all. 
• I feel that grouping the three points of view under days of the week when it turns out that one is happening more than a decade later is a bit sneaky and misleading.  If the book hadn't been broken up by day of week, fair enough, but I specifically questioned the various timelines early in the book, and that grouping under days of the week (along with references to the approaching eclipse) felt like a contract between author and reader that, yes, all three were happening concurrently.  At least now I don't have to point out all the things in Eve's story that wouldn't have made sense in the 80s but maybe work for the late 90s...
• I also don't understand the urgency in Eve's search for the Adirondack camp.  If she just wanted to find the camp, there was no rush, but she seemed to think she had a limited amount of time in which to find Sol and take revenge on him.  However, didn't she remember enough to know that Sol had gone through the door (part of her reason for wanting revenge)?  So why did she think he would be back on this particular day?  Maybe I missed something...
• This is a little, petty thing, but it's funny to me when authors use a mix of American and British English.  The incongruity takes me out of the story.  Also, I had a dry little chuckle that in the fantasy alternate universe briefly revealed at the end of the book, the main differences we're let in on are that the colors of certain road signs are different (ooh, ahh), diner coffee is better, corndogs are worse, and "there is even a burgeoning national health service".  OMG, the alternative-reality USA has seen the error of its ways and made their very own copy of the glorious NHS?!  Yippee!  (It really is an obsession for some people, isn't it?)
• I don't get the choice to make Root speak that way.  It's unnecessary and just makes the book harder to read.  I suspect it was mainly used to add another element of confusion and uncertainty to the story.  Presumably Root speaks oddly because the sunbeams have limited interaction with the other people in the community, but they're surrounded by other people and hear them talking all the time.  Also, the other sunbeams don't seem to speak in such a stunted fashion, so it still doesn't make sense. Maybe Root subconsciously affects this speech pattern to reflect a feeling of separation from the others.  Who knows?!
• Some plot elements are nonsensical.  For example, James has the opportunity to leave.  He fears for his life, so has every motivation to get the heck out of there.  He has a map/directions, which he used to find the camp only a week before, and he's all prepared to drive back out the way he came.  However, he discovers that his keys are gone, and he doesn't know how to hot-wire a car, so he would need to walk out instead.  He acts as though this is impossible because the directions are just sooooo confusing that he couldn't possibly follow them on foot.  Oh, and he's not wearing boots.  So.  You get it.  It's impossible, right?  Yeah, the route he took must've been wide enough to fit his car through, and he could've followed those same directions in the car, but it's out of the question that he should be able to attempt it on foot.  Are you nuts?!  Anyway, you see my frustration here, right?  It's dumb. Sure, ideally you'd want some water and boots, but if you're literally running for your life, you take a breath and get moving.  If the author didn't want the guy to get out, she needed to give us a better reason than that. Even just "I couldn't leave those kids to die without trying one more time" would've been better. 
• You can't have it both ways.  This cult-that-isn't-a-cult is supposed to feel mostly warm and fuzzy by the end of the book, but they still engaged in some awful behavior.  Branding people for disobedience?!  Feeding innocent children metal to turn them into human batteries? 
• So... Was Sol the father of all the sunbeams?  Just Root?  None of them at all?  Why did they all know who their mothers were (different women in the group) but no comment on their fathers? Maybe I missed something that made this point completely clear.
• One of the things in this book that elicits the most "ARGH" reaction from me is the fact that everyone in the cult/group goes to the same alternative dimension/reality.  Sol's premise, as I understand it, is that every decision we make creates a new fork in the road.  He chose to work late one day, which resulted in a car accident that claimed the lives of his wife and daughter.  He believes that there exists an offshoot of reality (another world) where he didn't work late, and so his family has survived and lives on.  The same thing is supposed to be true for everyone in the group: There's a reality where they made "the other choice", and everything worked out for the best. But... First of all, do you realize how many choices we make every day?  How many offshoot worlds there would have to be, if each decision created a fork in multiple directions to account for every possible option we could have chosen?  Do I eat a sandwich for lunch or have pizza?  Do I wear the red shirt or the blue?  Do I look to the right or the left? Each of these creates another world—and multiply that by every person alive.  And then each version of us in each reality faces a whole lifetime of further decisions and forks in the road.  There would be infinite dimensions or realities!  Or does The Universe somehow pick and choose which decisions are life-altering and only splits for those?  UGH.  And yet all the people in the group travel to the same alternate reality, so it seems like there's only this world and the other one... No, I'm sorry, but it's pure nonsense, even if I try to follow along with the theory for the sake of the story. 

How to Be a Hermit, or a Bachelor Keeps House

How to Be a Hermit, or a Bachelor Keeps House

by Will Cuppy

Blurb:

Humorous memoir by a socially-challenged book reviewer living alone in a shack on an island off Long Island, New York, in the 1920s.

My Reaction:
I had never heard of Will Cuppy until we found him on a list somewhere, recommended to fans of P.G. Wodehouse.  We started with The Decline and Fall of Practically Everyone, which we thought was funny in parts, but could have been better.  (You really need to know more ancient history than either of us do to get a lot of the jokes.)  

I believe it was in the afterward for The Decline and Fall that we read that Wodehouse himself was a fan of Cuppy—specifically, that he read How to Be a Hermit multiple times a year!  I don't know if that's true, but it was a good enough reason to try it ourselves, and I'm glad we did.  I found this book much the more entertaining of the two, and while I won't make an annual tradition of reading it, I certainly wouldn't mind returning to it at some point.  

If you're a fan of Wodehouse, I do think you might enjoy this—if what you love about Wodehouse is his ability to turn an amusing phrase.  If intricate plotting is what you're after, then no, you won't like How to Be a Hermit.  It really has no plot.  It's just a loosely linked collection of essays about his life as a "hermit" in the 1920s.  The majority of the essays relate to food in some way, or that's how it seemed to us as we read our way through them.  

I always find it amazing how much the same the human experience remains across time.  Admittedly, the 1920s aren't ancient history, but 1929 (when this was published) is nearly a century in the rearview mirror!  So many of the things he wrote about here had me nodding along in agreement.  There might be some differences (his medical book compared to our "Dr. Google"), but the results are the same (anxiety and convincing yourself that your minor complaint is a symptom of any of a dozen serious diseases).  

Because we'd already read a brief outline of Cuppy's life, certain elements of the book took on a darker, more melancholy tone that they otherwise would have had, thanks to an awareness of what lay in his future—but putting that to the side, this was a fun read.  I'll be interested to try more of his work!

The Legend of Rah & the Muggles

The Legend of Rah & the Muggles

by N.K. Stouffer

Blurb:

In another land far from the shoreline of Aura, war was raging, and Lady Catherine launched a raft with precious cargo aboard, her two infant sons. She wrapped the boys in royal blankets and quilts, and packed a jewel box filled with bright rubies and other gemstones between them. The raft drifted away with no charted destination but the babies' survival.

My Reaction:
Yet another 372-Pages read, shared with Donald, as usual.  

I'm updating my reading blog after four months or so, and I had almost forgotten this one.  How is that even possible?  

Top three things I remember about this book:

1.  You'll get whiplash from the stylistic changes in the beginning of the book.  It starts by recounting a nuclear war that causes (part of) the human race to mutate into a new species, then it turns into a wanna-be Harlequin romance, and then it morphs into a children's fairy-tale fantasy.  All within the first few chapters, if I recall correctly.  (It wanders off into something else later on, but I'll leave that for others to describe...)

2.  So many elements of the story are left hanging.  Zero payoff.  Highly annoying!  

3.  Do you vaguely remember that someone accused J.K. Rowling of plagiarizing her work with the Harry Potter series?  This is that book/author.  It's all absolute nonsense.  

Bonus thing I remember about this book:  There's a song, complete with lyrics and sheet music (though apparently it's as poorly composed as the rest of the book).  Some listeners recorded themselves playing or singing this song, and it still pops into my head from time to time, several weeks later.  Send help. 

The Last One at the Wedding

The Last One at the Wedding

Jason Rekulak

Blurb:

Frank Szatowski is shocked when his daughter, Maggie, calls him for the first time in three years. He was convinced that their estrangement would become permanent. He’s even more surprised when she invites him to her upcoming wedding in New Hampshire. Frank is ecstatic, and determined to finally make things right.

He arrives to find that the wedding is at a private estate—very secluded, very luxurious, very much out of his league. It seems that Maggie failed to mention that she’s marrying Aidan Gardner, the son of a famous tech billionaire. Feeling desperately out of place, Frank focuses on reconnecting with Maggie and getting to know her new family. But it’s difficult: Aidan is withdrawn and evasive; Maggie doesn’t seem to have time for him; and he finds that the locals are disturbingly hostile to the Gardners. Frank needs to know more about this family his daughter is marrying into, but if he pushes too hard, he could lose Maggie forever.

My Reaction:

I enjoyed Hidden Pictures much more than this, which seems to be a common opinion.  I had a hard time with just about every character in this book, and some of it was just...weird.  I mean, elements of the story were obviously meant to be weird, but there were also things that I suspect were intended to be endearing or relatable that didn't quite work for me.  There were also plot elements that made no sense, unless the characters involved are particularly stupid.  

Eh, it was something to read, and it's been long enough since I finished it that I don't have much to say, specifically.