Finished: Sea of Tranquility (St. John Mandel) Another good Emily St. John book! I had to reread my own recaps of Station 11 and The Glass Hotel to get a refresh on characters in case there were any crossovers, and there were! This was another page turner, but not in a murder mystery kind of way. Rather, there were several characters in different times in history whose stories end up being interconnected, and I quickly got attached to them. They all have one character in common who is time-traveling through history, meeting each of the characters, and trying to figure out if there is some kind of fracture in all their worlds, due to them all having the same experience with an unusual phenomenon. He's basically trying to figure out if they are all living in a simulation instead of in real life. This is the second book I've read in a few weeks that focuses on a deadly future pandemic, which, of course, is very timely. Jumping back and forth in time, we meet Edwin in 1912, who has basically been exiled by his parents in the UK for expressing his "outrageous" views. He's sent with an allowance, so has plenty of time to meander about and stumble across the unusual phenomenon. Next, we meet Olive in 2203, an author who lives on the moon, but is doing a book tour on earth promoting her red hot novel which is a story about, you guessed it...a pandemic. Little does she know that a pandemic far deadlier than covid 19 is just taking root and will be spread to the United States before her book tour is done. She's got a husband and little girl back home on the moon but whether or not she will actually make it back to them comes into question. At last we meet Gaspery-Jacques, a resident of a lunar colony in 2401. His brilliant sister, Zoey, works for the mysterious Time Institute. The Time Institute is where recruits go to learn how to time travel, with the express goal of investigating IF they are in fact living in a simulation, and if so, are there any cracks in the system throughout history. Gaspery begs his sister to let him become a time traveler and help with the cause. The number one rule at the Time Institute is that you can never do anything at all to change the course of history while you are in another time. After five years of training, Gaspery finally time travels where he meets Edwin and Olive, as well as a talented musician and a teenage girl who are also involved in the phenomenon. He knows the history of all these people before he ever meets him, and it becomes impossible for Gaspery to follow the number one rule...especially when he meets Olive. He knows that Olive will die from the horrific virus that is about to hit the U.S. only three days after he interviews her on her book tour. While talking to her, he convinces her to drop her book tour right that minute and head back to the moon. He saves her life, and changes history. Gaspery has also figured out that all these people have, in fact, experienced the exact same phenomenon at the exact same moment, in completely different times of history. This was a very unique book, at the same time, very reminiscent of St. John's other books. I really enjoyed it and hope there is more to come with these characters! 

 Finished: The Locked Door (McFadden) I haven't read an entire book in one day in a long, long time! This was the story of Nora, a 37 year old surgeon, who also happens to be the daughter of a notorious serial killer who was caught and imprisoned 26 years before...when his 11 year old daughter, Nora, turned him in. Nora was always a bit of a strange child, but she drew the line at finding a missing local woman in a cage down in her father's "work basement". Now, with her mother having committed suicide shortly after, and her grandmother raising her (first order of business, changing Nora's last name), Nora is a successful surgeon in a private practice where nobody knows who she is. She's also very closed off to having any kind of long term relationship, and her father, who is in prison for the rest of his life and who she hasn't communicated with in 26 years, continues to write her a letter a week which she rips up without reading. Nora's life begins to unravel when the police question her about not one, but two of her recent patients, who have turned up dead. And, not just dead, but dead with their hands chopped off. Young, dark-haired, blue-eyed women. Her father's exact M.O. When things start happening, like one of the missing hands from one of the girls is found in Nora's trunk, Nora reels and doesn't know who to trust and who to suspect in this elaborate setup. She's recently renewed a friendship with an old college boyfriend, Brady, who she'd only dated for 3 months, but who she's begun to have doubts about. And, her business partner and fellow surgeon, Philip, who is quite an overconfident skirt-chaser, has just set his sights on Nora's treasured office assistant, 25 year old, dark-haired, blue-eyed, Harper. Is Harper now in danger too? The ending is fast-paced, and I figured out who was setting Nora up to take the fall, but not why. It was a doozy! :-)

 Finished: Night Over Water (Follett) An older book of Follett's, but a very good one! The story is about a night that several people spend flying over the Atlantic from the UK to New York in a giant seaplane called the Pan Am Clipper. The Pan Am Clipper was a real airplane that was used from 1938 to 1941. In this story, Hitler has just declared war on the UK so this is one of the last flights out before the war begins. The luxury plane carries an aristocratic family fleeing the UK for America; a rich woman running away from her husband with a man she's just met; a young jewel thief, posing as one of the upper crust; an American movie star; a German physicist who has been freed from captivity in Germany and is fleeing to America, away from Hitler; an FBI agent escorting a murderer who has been extradited from the UK; an agent with the Scotland Yard; and a man who has a huge secret and a nefarious plan in the works. Someone on the plane isn't safe! The plane's engineer is being blackmailed to make sure the plane has to touch down in a different location than is planned for the final sea landing. One of these passengers will not make it to America if the bad guy has his way. Many relationships develop in the day it takes the plane to cross the Atlantic. And, a few people grow up and change their ways. A couple of surprise passengers join the plane at one of the refueling stops, and an unlikely hero or two emerge. It's a page-turning read and I'd love to know where most of the characters are now! :-) 

Finished: Malibu Rising (Reid) Loved this book! The story of the Riva siblings, children of world famous crooner, Mick Riva, who have basically been raised by the oldest sibling, Nina, since their devoted mother, June, died when Nina was just seventeen. Mick, though he loved June, had long been absent from their lives, having chosen a philandering, whirlwind, life on the road, touring the world and marrying and divorcing woman after woman. Having barely squeaked by monetarily, Nina had made sure that her brothers, Jay and Hud, fifteen when their mother died, finished high school, as well as her little sister, Kit, who was just 12 at the time. All four siblings have an extremely tight bond, and all four are drawn to the ocean and surfing. Growing up in Malibu, theirs was the Malibu of old beach houses and working day and night to make ends meet, i.e., before Malibu became the coastline playground for the rich it is now. By 1983, Jay has become a world champion surfer, and Hud the photographer that has put Jay's surfing prowess in all the magazines. The beautiful Nina has made enough money modeling for them all to be comfortable. And...she's married a very wealthy tennis champion. As we start the story, it is the day of the annual Riva end-of-summer party, and each of them is entering into it with less joy and more trepidation than they would like to admit. Nina, who has always taken care of everyone is shattered because her husband has left her for his female counterpart on the tennis world circuit. Jay has been informed at the age of twenty-three that he's got a serious health problem and may have to stop surfing. Hud has fallen in love with Jay's ex-girlfriend, and she with him, and he doesn't know how to tell Jay, who he has been extremely close with all his life. And Kit, the baby, at the age of twenty, has never yet kissed a boy and she's determined to change that at the party that night. As much as the world watches every move of the Riva siblings, they relish their private time together just being ordinary, eating sandwiches on the beach, ribbing each other, and, of course, all surfing together. The party starts, the famous guests arrive, the night gets wild, Nina's tennis husband comes home and begs for her to take him back, Jay finds out about Hud and his ex, and Kit discovers what she really wants. To top it all off, Mick Riva has chosen tonight to show back up in all their lives now that he's fifty and in his "waning" years in terms of the popularity of his kind of music. It's a fascinating story about how close the foursome are, how welcoming they are to another who may also be a sibling, how they stand strong and rally with each other, no matter how mad one may be at another. I loved the book, loved the ending and would love to read another story that catches up with Nina, Jay, Jud and Kit in a few years time! :-) 

 Finished: Damnation Spring (Ash Davidson) One of the best books I've read this year! Heartwarming, heartbreaking, visceral and so real. It is the story of lifelong logger, Rich, his wife, Colleen, and their five year old son, Chub, who in 1977 live and work in a small logging community on the northern California coast. Rich's father, grandfather, great-grandfather and so on, were all loggers, his father dying on the job when Rich was just a boy. Colleen is a lifelong resident who grew up with her parents and sister in a small cabin, her father a fisher and not a logger. Colleen and Rich are a true love story of being committed to each other, loving each other, arguing with each other, forgiving each other, joking with each other, and loving their son. Tragically, Colleen has had eight miscarriages in the years they've been married, the most recent being a baby girl lost at 22 weeks. They are both devastated and reeling. Colleen is desperate to have another baby, and Rich is now desperate not to get her pregnant again and watch her go through another loss. Meanwhile, Rich goes to work every day for the Sanderson company who does all the logging and milling of the forest in the area. When Sanderson's and the state's relentless spraying of pesticides in the area coincides with the protests from the naturalists who are against all the trees being cut down AND with what suddenly becomes a horrific number of birth defects in new born babies in the community, morals and responsibilities and generations of pride in being loggers and providing for their families come to blows. Colleen, who is an unofficial midwife in the area, is witness to one baby being born with the top half of it's head and brain missing. When three other couples have babies born with only partial brains, she can no longer stand as one with the logging community and deny that the spraying isn't poisoning them all. Anyone who opposes the spraying in the slightest is mercilessly turned on by the rest of the community, i.e., houses burned, children shunned at school, pets killed, etc. As it finally dawns on Rich that maybe Colleen is right and the spraying that goes directly into their water source may have been responsible for all her miscarriages, not to mention Chub's frequent nosebleeds, he sides with his wife and must face the wrath and revenge of the other loggers and the company. There is so much detail I'm leaving out, like what wonderful moments we see every day between Rich, Colleen and Chub as they traverse to the creek in the woods behind their house each morning to make sure they've got a clear pipe up to the house...Rich showing Chub all the while how to navigate the forest by using the palm of his hand as a map for all the creeks and boundaries. Or, like the sweet moments between Colleen and Chub when she asks him "where did you get those beautiful eyebrows?" and his answer is always "at the eyebrow store." Or, even the heart wrenching moments for Colleen of Chub's first day of kindergarten, which leave her truly alone for the first time in a long time. Or, the battle that Rich has with himself over his commitment to providing for his family the only way he knows how versus the risky step he takes financially to ensure their welfare in the future. Word by word, page by page, it's just a lovely book, but it doesn't sugarcoat the horrific moments. It makes them part of the lives of all these people as horrific moments are. As the person who recommended it to me said, the last fifty pages are a roller coaster of emotion, heartbreak and a bit of joy. It's definitely a book that will stay with me for awhile and one that I'd love to see a follow up to. 

 Finished: The Match (Coben) Another great page-turner by one of my favorites, Harlan Coben. :-) The protagonist of this story is Wilde, who we met in The Boy in the Woods. Wilde is 40ish now, he's not really sure, because he was left in the woods as a child to fend for himself. Only by befriending another little boy, David, whose family owned a house at the edge of the woods, was he brought into society, where David's mother, Hesther Crimstein became like a surrogate mother to him. He still had no memory of how he was left in the woods, still preferred living in his reclusive abode in the woods, and still remained close to Hesther, David's son, Matthew and David's widow, Laila. In this story, Wilde has decided to input his DNA into "one of those sites" to see if he gets a match. He's finally ready to see if he's got a mother and/or father out there, and to learn what exactly happened to make them leave him in the woods. Hester Crimstein is a brilliant attorney, and also a mainstay in several of the Coben novels. She's quite prominent in both of the Wilde books, there for advice, and there when Wilde's search takes a mysterious turn as he gets a hit for a possible parent, and at the same time, a hit for a possible half-sibling. When he reaches out to the possible parent (a father), he sets some frantic wheels in motion because it turns out his father is in the Witness Protection Program. By the time Wilde reaches back out to the potential half-sibling, Peter, he has gone missing. A complicated mystery ensues involving DNA matches, reality tv shows, a secret online vigilante society, and three murders (and counting). In the end, we do finally learn what happened to Wilde as a child, but there are some ends left dangling and a couple of unanswered questions. I'm really hoping there is a Wilde book #3. 

 Finished: To Paradise (Yanagihara) This 700 page novel is basically three books in one, somehow interwoven, but at the same time not at all. As you get to know the characters in each section, you see that the same names and surnames are used over and over, as is the same house in Washington Square, though most of the same-named people are not related at all, at least as far as the reader knows. The first section begins in 1893 America where the country is divided after the Civil War into the Free States, the Colonies, the West and the North. New York is part of the Free States where black people are not welcome to live, but are aided in their journeys to get to safe places. However, in the Free States, homosexuals are free to live and marry, and as a matter of fact, it's more common than different sex marriages. We meet the first Nathaniel in 1893, Nathaniel Bingham, a rich banker and founding member of the Free States who is determined to find a marriage match for his grandson, David, who is homosexual like his two siblings, but has never been as socially adept as they have been. David is underwhelmed by his grandfather's choice for him, a man twenty years his senior named Charles Griffith, from a fine family. When David decides he's in love with Edward, the very poor music instructor at one of their family foundations, he shocks both his grandfather and Charles when he decides to run off with Edward to The West...to paradise. In the second section, the year is 1993 and we are introduced to David, a paralegal at a law firm who is in a relationship with a very senior partner in the law firm, Charles Griffith. The AIDS epidemic is thriving in America and takes a few of Charles and David's friends as David questions whether he should tell Charles about his father, the true heir to the Hawaiian kingdom who had deserted his title when Hawaii decided to become it's own nation. We leave David pondering this question while the second part of this second section turns into a long letter written to David by his dying father (also a David). In it, his father explains about his life and how he let a friend he's known since childhood, Edward, run roughshod over his life and move them to a parcel of land in Hawaii that belonged to the lost kingdom, leaving his mother, David's grandmother to raise the younger David. Long disgusted with his father, David moved to the States and hadn't seen his father in years. At the end of the letter, as the bedridden father imagines he's up and walking in a garden each night, we assume that he has drifted away to death as his last words are that he'll see his son soon as he travels to see him....to paradise. The third section of the book is by far the largest part of the book and begins in 2093 in New York, which is no longer called New York, in a world that has been inundated by plagues and pandemics and has turned into a totalitarian dictatorship run by the state. There are scientists constantly trying to identify new diseases, while at the same time trying to develop cures for them. Charles Griffith is one such scientist who years ago moved his young family, husband Nathaniel and young son David, from Hawaii, where they were all happy, to New York where they lived in Section 8, while Charles became more and more entangled with the state. This section goes back and forth from 2043 where Charles is writing letters about his life to a dear friend in New Britain, and 2093 where Charles's granddaughter is married and living with her husband, Edward, in a marriage arranged by Charles . We learn how Charles and Nathaniel's marriage deteriorates as Nathaniel grows unhappy and David becomes an unhappy, rebellious teenager. David's rebellion goes farther than that...he becomes one of the insurgents who believes the State is lying about the need for all of their liberties to be so limited, and that they are thrusting pandemics on people purposefully to try and control them. David and Charles become estranged, but when David takes up with a female insurgent, she gives birth to Charles' granddaughter who is basically left to be raised by Charles and Nathaniel after David is executed for being an insurgent and the baby's mother, being less than maternal, signs over her rights. Before dying, David names his daughter Charlie. Charlie is a bright, precocious, inquisitive, beautiful child until the pandemic of 2070 where she is felled by the illness that kills most everyone it touches. She is given a controversial medicine that cures her, but leaves her with pockmarks, the loss of hair (which grows back very limp), a personality with very little affect and much slower cognitive reasoning. After Nathaniel dies, several years after their divorce, Charles and Charlie move into the house Nathaniel inherited on Washington Square. (Yes, the same house.)  In Charles' letters we see how he dedicates his life to caring for Charlie and teaching her how to live in society, while continuing to work for the state. As he gets older and realizes he won't be alive for all of Charlie's life, he makes it a mission to arrange a marriage for her where she will be taken care of at all costs. The man who agrees to marry Charlie, Edward, is a homosexual who is in love with a man, but by this time in the country's history, homosexual marriages are not allowed and relationships can be dangerous. It's interesting to see the world through Charlie's eyes in 2093 and then back through Charles' eyes in the years leading up to the end of the story. Charles is executed by insurgents who briefly take over the state not long after Charlie is married. But, in his last letter to his friend in New Britain, Charles pleads with his friend to please get Charlie out of America if he can, to a free life in New Britain. As Charlie's story comes to an end, after her husband has just passed away, a boat comes to get her and she realizes she is going to start her new life with the help of her beloved grandfather's trusted friend. She's going...to paradise. It was a long, but very good read. I loved A Little Life by Yanagihara, and this book was as compelling, but in different ways. Here is the blurb on Amazon that probably explains things better and more concisely than I just did. :-) 

"In an alternate version of 1893 America, New York is part of the Free States, where people may live and love whomever they please (or so it seems). The fragile young scion of a distinguished family resists betrothal to a worthy suitor, drawn to a charming music teacher of no means. In a 1993 Manhattan besieged by the AIDS epidemic, a young Hawaiian man lives with his much older, wealthier partner, hiding his troubled childhood and the fate of his father. And in 2093, in a world riven by plagues and governed by totalitarian rule, a powerful scientist’s damaged granddaughter tries to navigate life without him—and solve the mystery of her husband’s disappearances.

 
These three sections are joined in an enthralling and ingenious symphony, as recurring notes and themes deepen and enrich one another: A townhouse in Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village; illness, and treatments that come at a terrible cost; wealth and squalor; the weak and the strong; race; the definition of family, and of nationhood; the dangerous righteousness of the powerful, and of revolutionaries; the longing to find a place in an earthly paradise, and the gradual realization that it can’t exist. What unites not just the characters, but these Americas, are their reckonings with the qualities that make us human: Fear. Love. Shame. Need. Loneliness.
 
To Paradise is a fin de siecle novel of marvelous literary effect, but above all it is a work of emotional genius.  The great power of this remarkable novel is driven by Yanagihara’s understanding of the aching desire to protect those we love—partners, lovers, children, friends, family and even our fellow citizens—and the pain that ensues when we cannot."

 Finished: No Exit (Adams) A definite page-turner about Darby, a young college student, who gets caught in a snowstorm while driving to see her dying mother. She barely makes it into the remote Colorado rest stop when the more immediate terror begins. There are only four other people stuck at the rest stop as well, and when she goes outside to try and find a cell phone signal, she spies a young child, trapped in a dog crate in the back of a van. One of the four people inside has most likely a kidnapped the child, but which one? And, who can she trust after she figures out who is driving the van? Snowed in with no cell service, Darby must figure out a way to save both the child and herself while trying to outsmart a very deranged person. The book has already been made into a television movie, so I'm not going to give any spoilers. It was a terrifying book, with several unexpected twists! :-)

 Finished: The Overnight Guest (Gudenkauf) A pretty good page-turner about a triple homicide that happened on a farm twenty years earlier, leaving twelve year old Josie without her parents or brother. The story is told in the present day time and in the twenty years past time...and is also told by a third viewpoint, that of a little girl who is apparently being held captive with her mother in a basement and has been all her life. There are lots of twists and turns, while the current day crime author, Wylie, who is staying at the remote farm cabin where it all went down, is trying to finish her latest book. With a huge snow storm hitting, Wylie heads out to load up her firewood and finds a small child nearly frozen to death in the snow and takes him into the cabin to warm him up. When he wakes up, he is terribly uncommunicative and frightened and some of the twists start falling into place, but not necessarily how you think they will. :-) 

Finished: Black Cake (Wilkerson) One of those books that I truly enjoyed, whose characters I want to sit with awhile, so I'm going to be very lazy and paste the Amazon blurb here. I will say that I really loved the friendship of Covey and Bunny as they grew up on their Caribbean island, learning to long distance swim and always having each other's backs. I love that the book is really Covey's story, but we also get enough of Bunny's, Byron's, Benny's and Marble's stories to grow attached and, more importantly, attach them all together. And, of course, I'd love to taste that black cake!! :-) 

From Amazon:

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 traditional Caribbean 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.