The Death of Us by Lori Rader-Day

 Liss Kehoe’s life changed the day her husband’s lover, Ashley Hay, dropped off their baby Callan and never returned in the page-turner mystery The Death of Us by Lori Rader-Day coming out October 3. Never mind that Callan is a “love child”—Liss loved him unconditionally and raised him into the teenager he has become in a twisted tale of love, betrayal, and family secrets.

 

The plot starts 15 years later when a car is spotted in a quarry on the Kehoe family property consisting of the original home in which Liss, Link, and Callan lived until she kicked out Link  as well as the newer home where Link’s parents Patty and Rockwell live. Callan and his friends almost wind up in the quarry themselves when their driver loses control in the same area. Law enforcement arrives and begins a recovery of the submerged car, which appears to be Ashley’s vehicle.

 

Liss had always feared that Ashley would show up one day wanting to reclaim Callan, but Liss could never have guessed that Ashley might have run off the road the night she gave Callan to Liss. Will there be a body when the car is pulled out? If it turns out to be Ashley’s remains in the car, what caused her to drive into the quarry? Was she suicidal or was there something more evil going on?

After the quarry discovery and identification is complete, Liss starts receiving hangups at all times in the night and early morning. Someone paints “KILLER” in red on her white barn. Apparently, her mailbox has suffered an “accident.” She comes home one night to see a light moving around in her house so she flees and calls the police. She and Callan need not only protection but also answers that will put this seeming scandal and possible murder to rest.

 

Lori Rader-Day is also the author of Death at Greenway, a work of historical fiction about a mystery at the home of Agatha Christie where children were evacuated during World War II. Born in Indiana, she lives in Chicago, where she teaches creative writing for Northwestern University.

My review will be posted on Goodreads starting August 23, 2023.

I would like to thank William Morrow and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in return for an objective review.

 

The Exchange: After the Firm by John Grisham

 Apparently, Mitch McDeere, the protagonist of The Firm (1991), was not finished with author John Grisham as The Exchange: After the Firm is Grisham’s latest legal thriller coming out October 17. This novel answers the question about what became of Mitch and his wife Abby after they revealed that Mitch’s law firm, Bendini, Lambert & Locke, in Memphis was corrupt.

 

The story picks up 15 years later with Mitch and his family – now including twin boys: Clark and Carter – living in Manhattan where Mitch has become a partner in the world’s largest law firm, Scully & Pershing, and Abby is a cookbook editor.

An Italian colleague in Rome, Luca Sandroni, has requested Mitch’s assistance in  dealing with a situation in Libya involving Lannak, a Turkish construction company that has not received full payment for a bridge it constructed for none other than Colonel Gaddafi. Sandroni’s health is failing, and he would like Mitch to partner with his lawyer daughter Giovanna in the London office in hopes this experience would help boost her career.

When Mitch and Giovanna go to Libya to see the bridge to determine for themselves the situation at hand, things go terribly wrong, putting Mitch right back into a situation that endangers not only himself but his family, friends, and colleagues. A kidnapping occurs requiring a hefty exchange of money  that no single entity could cover. The enemy proves to be ruthless killers with a penchant for WARNING: violence and gore.

The end of the tale leaves one to wonder, will there be a Firm volume 3?

 John Grisham made a name for himself with his very first  novel, A Time to Kill (1989), followed by other court procedural novels that made him king of the modern legal thriller. Having worked 60+ hour weeks in a Mississippi law practice, Grisham knows what he’s talking about.

Bright Lights, Big Christmas by Mary Kay Andrews

The Tollivers have a Christmas tree farm in the mountains of North Carolina in the holiday novella Bright Lights, Big Christmas by Mary Kay Andrews due out September 26. Usually, Murphy and his father Jock haul the trees to New York City to sell starting a month before Christmas, but this year, Jock’s health is interfering with their usual plans so Murphy tells his sister Kerry that she has to step up.

 

Kerry moved back home to NC recently after being termed “redundant” in her art agency job. She is reluctant to haul the Tolliver’s small, dilapidated camper to New York to provide a place for her and Murphy to live while selling the trees. But when push comes to shove, Kerry musters up the energy to hall “Spammy” to New York with her father’s truck.

 

The Tolliver family has developed great relationships over the years with the business owners and residents in Greenwich Village where they set up a lot to sell their trees. When another tree company tries to undersell the Tollivers, arranging their business just across the street, Kerry ups their game using her artistic abilities. The competitors challenge back with theft and vandalism until Murphy stands up to them.

 

Embraced by their temporary neighbors, Kerry becomes close with Patrick and his son Austin along with an aging gentleman known as Heinz as well as the retail shop owners. Restaurant owner Claudia feeds the Tollivers and provides restroom facilities while the bakery next door to her provides plenty of coffee and pastries.

 

When Heinz goes missing, Kerry and Murphy make a wide search of the area looking for him. Turns out, there is much that the Tollivers and the residents in Greenwich Village do not know about the elderly man who they think may be homeless.

When Patrick wants to dial up the friendship to romance, Kerry is reluctant, although she isn’t immune to his charms nor those of his sweet son Austin. She and Murphy are supposed to be heading back to North Carolina to spend Christmas with their mother and father; however, a snowstorm along with icy roads threatens to delay their plans to return home for Christmas.

 

Mary Kay Andrews, the Queen of Summer Reads, has provided readers with another holiday novella following her last one, The Santa Suit. Andrews, a pseudonym for Kathy Hogan Trocheck, splits her time between Atlanta and a second home on Tybee Island.

My review will be posted on Goodreads starting August 13, 2023.

I would like to thank St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in return for an objective review.

The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger

 The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger is a powerful novel due out September 5 about a small town in Minnesota on Decoration Day in 1958 when a wealthy and cruel man is found dead along the Alabaster River. Lots of grievances toward Jimmy Quinn over the years makes any number of people a suspect,

While the folks of Jewel have turned out for a parade honoring the sacrifices of those residents who fought in various wars of the past, one as far back as Wounded Knee in 1890, one citizen hightails it to town to report to the sheriff Brody Dern that he found Quinn’s deteriorating body.

Questions start emerging: why was he in the river in only his underwear? Did he drown while trying to swim? Why did he have a gun at his campsite where he told his family he would be fishing? War-scarred Sheriff Dern and his deputies weigh in on different leads as the investigation gains traction when the coroner surprises them with the actual cause of death.

Before the investigation gets very far, the townspeople start circulating rumors zeroing in on Noah Bluestone as Quinn just fired the Dakota from working on Quinn’s farm. Old resentments are stirred about Native Americans and land ownership in Black Earth County. Worse, Bluestone, a World War II veteran, brought home a Japanese wife, Kyoko.

As the mystery of Quinn’s death sparks anger, even though so many hated the man, various other townsfolk become involved in the story. Angie Madison, a widow, needs help finding her teenage son when he takes off with his best friend Del, a teen being abused by his mother’s lover, Tyler Creasy. Del is armed and plans to kill Creasy who had just beat Del and his mother to a pulp. Creasy  could also be  another suspect in Quinn’s death as the two did not get along.

A former sheriff and part-time deputy, Conrad Graff sees the need to protect Kyoko when her husband is arrested, partly to guard Noah, what with all the allegations flying. Both Bluestones are supported by the local newspaper editor, Sam Wicklow, and a retired female lawyer, Charlie Bauer. As the investigation develops, one of these characters learns that Jimmy Quinn was a monster while discovering who actually killed him.

William Kent Krueger, raised in the Cascade Mountains of Oregon, makes a living as a full-time author. He writes the popular Cork O’Connor series about a sheriff in the north woods of Minnesota who is part Irish and part Ojibwe.  In addition, his stand-alone novel, Ordinary Grace, received an Edgar Award as best mystery of 2012. Krueger lives in St. Paul with his wife of 40-plus years.

 

My review will be posted on Goodreads starting August 12, 2023.

I would like to thank Atria Books and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in return for an objective review.

 In the novel Tom Lake, releasing on August 8, Ann Patchett tells a tale of a cherry farm family in the time of the pandemic in the spring of 2020. Lara and Joe’s three daughters have sought sanctuary on their North Michigan farm.

Since many of their usual cherry pickers are confined to where they live, Lara and Joe appreciate the help from Emily, Maisie, and Nell. As they pick cherries, Lara tells them the story of her turn as an actress, her experience in summer stock at Tom Lake, and her romance with famous actor Peter Duke.

Having heard bits and pieces all their lives, Emily once was positive Duke had been her father. Now she lives in the small house on the farm after finishing her degree in horticulture, planning to take over the farm when her parents retire. Her boyfriend Benny from the neighboring farm also pitches in even though there is plenty of apple picking to be done in his orchard.

Both Maisie and Nell returned for the safety of their farm when their colleges closed in March. Maisie is studying to be a veterinarian, and in the quarantine, she is called upon among her neighbors to care for their stock and their pets. Nell pursues drama, hoping to be an actress like her mother once was.

Told on two timelines, the author reveals the account of a young Lara and Duke, who meet doing Our Town in summer stock. Lara played the role of Emily in high school and college making her a natural choice when the original actress leaves for a better opportunity. In the pandemic story line, readers learn about the family dynamics of farm families, especially this close-knit family.

Lara keeps part of her story as an actress having a romance on set a secret from even her husband. Otherwise, Joe knows most of the story, helping to tell it here and there. The daughters gain much insight into a time in the couple’s life before their birth in this engaging narrative that only hints at the pandemic here and there. In a surprise visit from someone in her acting past, a big reveal is made to Lara in the ending of the novel.

Ann Patchett’s Dutch House was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Born in Los Angeles, she moved to Nashville, Tennessee, as a child and continues to live there where she and a partner own Parnassus Books, an independent bookstore.

Out of Nowhere by Sandra Brown

 If a book about a mass shooting that is also a sex-fueled thriller seems baffling, that is just what readers get in Sandra Brown’s latest, Out of Nowhere, available in August. The carnage occurs during a county fair in Texas where Elle Portman and  her two-year-old son Charlie are caught up in a logjam at the entrance/exit gate. Several people were shot, some fatally. One of the injured is Calder Hudson who is hit when he makes a flying leap to rescue Charlie whose stroller goes off course and starts to tip.

Some good police work turns up a dead shooter quickly, bringing some relief to the survivors. However, when the forensic evidence does not fully support the early findings, the detectives question Elle and Calder along with three other survivors over and over, leaving them emotionally bereft. 

Adding to the confusion, the pressure from news media for the latest tidbit, including Calder’s girlfriend, reporter Shauna Calloway, is overwhelming. A support group brings together some of the survivors including Elle and a woman named Dawn who was shot in the calf. While Elle refuses all interviews, Dawn Whitley is the first to give her story to Shauna. Calder refuses to let Shauna interview him or use his name to persuade other survivors to come forth with their perspective about the attack. Their relationship comes to a breaking point causing Calder to move out. 

The devastating circumstances of the shooting are hard to read as in any news media coverage of real mass killings. The drive to get justice for those who died is a uniting force between Elle, Calder, and Dawn. When Shauna irresponsibly reveals their names, authorities swoop in to secure the three in a safe house as already one has received a death threat. 

 

Bonded by tragedy, Elle and Calder cannot ignore a growing attraction between them, but the circumstances of their meeting make them question if being together would just be too painful to create a lasting relationship from the steamy one that has developed. When the killer finds Elle, Calder, and Dawn in the secure house, their grieving turns into a fight for survival. The twist of an ending is shocking when the killer who has been an unreliable narrator throughout is revealed.

Sandra Brown, whose first novel was published in 1981, has penned more than 70 novels. Known for romantic suspense and detailed sex scenes, she once tried her hand successfully with a book of historical fiction about the Great Depression, Rainwater (2009).  Brown, who lives in Texas, has seen four of her books adapted for film. 

Hello Stranger by Katherine Center

 Hello Stranger is the new reality for portrait artist Sadie Montgomery as she suffers from a side effect of brain surgery called prosopagnosia, or face blindness, a neurological disorder characterized by the inability to recognize faces, in the latest from Katherine Center that arrived on bookshelves July 11.

 

Sadie had just placed as a finalist in the North American Portrait Society competition when she was ready to celebrate and start her entry only to be shot down thanks to her brain scrambling the pieces of people’s faces. She only has a few weeks to start and finish a new portrait to enter into the contest that offers a huge prize. While face blindness may be only temporary, there are no guarantees that the faces she sees will clear up.

As if suffering face blindness was not enough of a challenge, Sadie faces other problems: major family issues thanks to an evil stepsister, the failing health of her dog Peanut who her late mother had given her, and an obsession with two men, one her handsome new vet and the other a neighbor in her art studio/apartment building.

As she struggles to create a portrait for the competition when she cannot even see her subject’s face any other way but in “pieces,” her end result  tends to look like something scrambled as in a Picasso painting, an entry the Portrait Society is not likely to favor. Because this is a contemporary romance, readers will get feel-good vibes as Sadie deals with life as a face-blind person juggling potential romances with two men whose faces she cannot see.

Katherine Center is the New York Times bestselling author of nine other books, including The Bodyguard, Things You Save in a Fire, and What You Wish For. Her book The Lost Husband was made into a Netflix movie, and Happiness for Beginners will air on Netflix starting July 27 starring Luke Grimes from the TV series “Yellowstone.” Center lives in her hometown of Houston, Texas, with her family.