The Butterfly Collector

Title:  The Butterfly Collector

Author:  Tea Cooper

Publication Information:  Harper Muse. 2023. 400 pages.

ISBN:  1400245176 / 978-1400245178

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "My office, if you please, Miss Binks."

Favorite Quote:  "Never can tell what fate will decide."

The Butterfly Collector is and is not about butterflies - monarchs in particular. The book is a moving historical mystery that tells its story in two timelines - late 1800s in Morpeth, Australia and the 1920s in Sydney, Australia.

In the 1800s, there is Theodora, who would spend her time chasing butterflies rather than social connections and potential husbands.

In the 1920s, there is Verity, a reporter who has lost her job to the men returning from war but who then receives an intriguing gift of a dress and an invitation to a masquerade ball. The proposition offered at the ball leads Verity to Morpeth and what transpired there decades earlier.

The book picks up on two completely different and completely unconnected facets of Australian history. The first history is that of the arrival of the monarchs in Australia in the 1870s. It has never been determined exactly how that happened - larvae on board a ship, an adult that happened to land on an incoming vessel, a long flight by the monarch itself, or some human intervention.

The second history is an unsavory one of baby farming. An infant was placed in the care of someone because of the needs of the parents. Some parents could not care for the baby at all; some needed care allowing them to work and provide for their family. The history goes that some of these children were then "adopted" out by these caretakers for monetary gain. as per the author's note, "Sadly, it was a lucrative and flourishing business in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, general in the larger cities."

The fictional story flows back and forth seamlessly between the two time periods once I sort through all the characters and who belongs in which timeline. While I originally chose the book because of the title and cover about butterflies, I invest in both the histories told and the stories woven around the history. 

The element of mystery adds to the story. Why is Verity chosen for this task? Where does the dress come from? What exactly is the Treadwell Foundation? How does Theodora's story connect to Verity's?

The setting and the descriptions of the landscape, the river, and the homes add to the story as well, making it a very visual story. This, perhaps, even more than the story itself, will stick with me.

This is the first book I have read by Tea Cooper. I look forward to reading more.

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The Black Angels

Title:  The Black Angels: The Untold Story of the Nurses Who Helped Cure Tuberculosis

Author:  Maria Smilios

Publication Information:  G.P. Putnam's Sons. 2023. 448 pages.

ISBN:  0593544927 / 978-0593544921

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "Every morning Virginia Allen wakes and feels the weight of the hours moving."

Favorite Quote:  "They did it because it was their job, because they had committed themselves to saving lives, at the risk of their own. But also because they were Black women, subjects of the Jim Crow labor laws that offered them few options."

In 1951, the cure for tuberculosis was tested successfully at Sea View Hospital in Staten Island. This book is the history of the nurses involved in that endeavor and in the care of the tuberculosis patients at the hospital. From the author's notes: "All the accounts and scenes in the book - including quotes, thoughts, and reactions - are used on oral reports, which have been corroborated by a wealth of material: newspapers, journals, letters, memoirs, marriage and death certificates, draft cards, medical records, autopsy books, nurses' logs and medicine books, hospital publications, yearbooks, previous interviews, and any other material the librarians could dig up."

The "black" angels is a reference to race. Most, if not all, the nurses were black. The why of that has its history in the Jim Crow South. Tuberculosis is a highly contagious disease. Patients were often isolated in dedicated sanitarium hospitals. Caring for these patients brought with the daily risk of exposure and illness. As such, many who had the choice left the jobs to care for these patients, creating a severe nursing shortage. The hospitals turned to the South, advertising jobs that included room, board, training, a nursing license, and a small salary as compensation take on this risky job.

Many young women of color saw this as an escape from the Jim Crow South and as an opportunity to create a better life. This book recounts the history of these women and the world altering research that their work and dedication made possible.

The book is not just about the hospital and the medical advances. It also tells of the life of the women as they faced the challenges of their jobs and the challenges of continued discrimination and hostility even in Staten Island. Ultimately, it is the inspiring lesson of their strength and endurance.

The term "black angels" was supposedly coined by the hospital patients for they saw the color of the skin and they saw the care that these "angels" brought to them.

Virginia Allen, age 93, is the last alive of the black angels. The author conducted extensive interviews with Dr. Allen and learned of others from her to write this book. "Soon, a rich and vibrant history began to unfold, one that placed the nurses at the center of the TB story and set them against a backdrop of larger themes: Jim Crow, the Great Migration, systemic and institutional racism, front-line labor in a public health emergency, disease and the science of vaccines, and the desire to live a free and meaningful life - the impetus for so many of the nurses and the heartbeat of their narrative." An inspiring history.

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All the Water in The World

Title:  All the Water in The World

Author:  Eiren Caffall

Publication Information:  St. Martin's Press. 2025. 304 pages.

ISBN:  1250353521 / 978-1250353528

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "The Monster in the Water: This is the hypercane, the biggest king of hurricane there could be."

Favorite Quote:  "If there was light here, there could be light in other places. If there was power in me, I could spread it. I could let that power glow and make myself a beacon."

There is The World As It Was and The World As It Is. There are memories of what was, and there are the challenges and reality of what is. Nonie and her family are survivors. She, her sister, and her father have survived the storms that drowned New York City and perhaps much of the rest of the world. Nonie has the unique ability to "feel" water. She can sense storms.

They live in the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) along with a few others who survived - a family created. The AMNH provides a refuge from the elements, a safe space from the Lost scavenging the city, and a way to try and preserve the treasures of the museum. Per the book description and the author's note, the setting of the museum and the work of Nonie's parents as researchers and curators is an homage to real individuals in Iraq and Leningrad who worked to save historical treasures in times of war and upheaval. If I had not read that note, I don't know that I would make that connection. This book is definitely not historical fiction, but this note did send me in search of that history.

The plot of the book is straight forward. A storm like no other - a hypercane - has arrived. In scientific research, a "hypercane" is a theoretical, extreme tropical storm with enormous destructive power that could form if ocean temperatures get to 50°C (122°F). This is a storm that Nonie does not feel. It just arrives. The storm forces Nonie and her family to flee the AMNH. The goal is to travel up the Hudson River to their mother's childhood home - a farm that may or may not still exist. It is unclear why they feel that the farm survived the storms and provides a safe space, but they do. A dreamed Utopia, perhaps? The dream of safety and peace that every refugee has, perhaps?

The book then tells the story of this precarious journey. As the book description states, "They encounter communities that have adapted in very different and sometimes frightening ways to the new reality." This is a book of survival and, in some sense, adventure. As expected, there are helpers along the way and those who would harm. In each encounter is a microcosm of society - communities organized and run in different ways, individuals who follow along with the leaders and those who would follow the voice of their conscience and of humanity.

Flashbacks bring in the past - the people, the places, and the things lost. These memories help to flesh out the main characters and create a greater intensity to the emotions of the book. A post-apocalyptic book of danger and survival can sometimes provide the perfect escape from reality! All the Water in the World is such a book. It helps that I can visualize and put myself in the physical setting of the book. At some point, I think this book would make a good movie. The ending is perhaps too neat a package, but what an adventure getting there.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

Good Dirt

Title:  Good Dirt

Author:  Charmaine Wilkerson

Publication Information:  Ballantine Books. 2025. 368 pages.

ISBN:  0593358368 / 978-0593358368

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "'Shhh,' her bother says."

Favorite Quote:  "What had they done? This was the question that hung in the air above every black family that had ever run into misfortune. And not only. It was a subtext understood by so many women, of any color, who had ever been harmed. It was the question that few dared to ask out loud but many had in mind, with regard to families that struggled to pay the bills. It was the question asked by those who wishes to avoid acknowledging that responsibility might lie elsewhere. What did you do?"

From Connecticut to the South to Africa to Europe and around again, this book tells a circular story centered around one family, one family heirloom, and one act of violence that forever altered them.

At the center of the story is Ebony "Ebby" Freeman. The two defining moments of her life... At age ten, she sees her older brother murdered in a home invasion. At twenty something, she is left standing waiting at the alter as her groom does not show. After being jilted with no explanation, she runs away to France to a friend. Ebby's story is about coming to terms with her past and forging a path forward. "This was the true miracle of life, he thought. Not so much to be born as to bear up under what comes your way. To find a way forward. To embrace what was good."

Surrounding Ebby are her loving parents. The Freemans are the only Black family in an otherwise completely white enclave of Connecticut. They are successful in their careers and affluent. They cherish their children. Because of their son's brutal death, they are even more protective of Ebby.

Anchoring this family is their history, particularly as it is embodied in Old Mo. Old Mo is a stoneware jar that has been in the family for generations. The book intersperses Ebby's story with the stories of those generations and their trials through being ripped from their home to the enslavement of generations to the eventual treacherous journey to freedom. The clay of the jar gives the book its title. "Her dad's mom would like the soil around here. Good dirt, she would say. There is a town, not far away, that is famous for its clay."

The jar is all the more special for its secrets - words engraved in the clay as reading and writing was forbidden for slaves. However, the maker of the jar knew. "... Words also had the power to hold memory." And "Words have power. So does the absence of words. Sometimes, when people choose not to speak, their silence can block out the sun."

This book, like Charmaine Wilkerson's debut Black Cake, covers a lot of ground. Through all the characters and their individual stories, the book delves into this nation's history:

• "Most of the trouble in this world boils down to one person not recognizing the worth of another."
• "Things are always changing ... It's true, some of the worst things keep repeating themselves, but things do change. And as citizens, we can do our part to keep things moving in the right direction."
• "History, too often, has been told from only certain perspectives. This is not good enough. History is a collective phenomenon. It can only be told through a chorus of voices. And that chorus must make room for new voices over time."

Yet, the story winds back again and again to Ebby and her parents, grounding that history through the lives of this family. Another wonderful story by the author.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

Isola

Title:  Isola

Author:  Allegra Goodman

Publication Information:  The Dial Press. 2025. 368 pages.

ISBN:  0593730089 / 978-0593730089

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "I still dream of birds."

Favorite Quote:  "I am done living fearfully."

Historically, Marguerite de La Rocque's date and place of birth are not known. Her date and place of death are not known. However, the story of her life is remembered and has been retold in different ways since the 1500s when she lived to today. This book brings her story to life and does what I loved about historical fiction. It tells a great story, one that has me turning pages. It paints a well-defined character that has me invested in the story. It introduces me to a history I would never otherwise have come across.

The history goes that Marguerite was an heiress who was orphaned early in life. She lived on her estate with a governess and servants. The estate was managed by a relative, Jean-François de La Rocque de Roberval. Historians do not agree on the exact relationship - uncle, brother, cousin. This book depicts a cousin. This part of the story depicts the lack of control a woman - any woman regardless of wealth or class - had over her own life at that time. Marguerite is an heiress and yet her wealth is controlled entirely by a male relative, who does not have her best interests at heart. She has servants aplenty, but their actions are controlled by the one who controls their pay, even if he does it with Marguerite's inheritance. He is the one in charge.

At his insistence and under his control, Marguerite accompanies Roberval as he travels to the New World to take on a governing position. On the voyage, Marguerite beings a love story with Roberval's assistant. Displeased, Roberval punishes her by dropping them off to survive on a deserted island in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. That is the reference for the book's title. "I leaned over the table to see jagged coasts and islands dimpled all around the waves. Each was called ISOLA." Some say it was the phantom island knowns as the Isle of Demons. Some say their ghosts can still be seen there. Had I not known the historical basis for this book, I would say such an action was far-fetched. The story is all the more compelling for being based in history.

The story continues with survival on the island and life after. The story of life after seems somewhat anticlimactic after the buildup of her childhood and the intensity of the time on the island. It completes the story historically and emphasizes the story of survival but lacks the emotion of the rest of the story.

Overall, the book tells a compelling story of this young woman's fight for survival and of her evolution from a pampered child to a strong survivor. I feel for the young, orphaned child and cheer for the woman who faces her dire circumstances and survives.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard

Title:  The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard

Author:  Natasha Lester

Publication Information:  Forever. 2024. 464 pages.

ISBN:  1538706954 / 978-1538706954

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "In the same way that the Electric Circus nightclub in Manhattan is all about sensual overwhelm, so too is the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles, Hawk thinks as he strides in the gallery beside four other men."

Favorite Quote:  "Loving someone and making them feel loved are two different things. It's easy to just love, but it takes effort to make another person believe in that love."

Three women: Mizza, Astrid, and Blythe. Three time periods: 1917, 1970, and the present. Three places - Paris, New York, and the French countryside. Three stories but one theme that is clearly explained in the author's note:

• "Find a famous woman - and find a stream of falsehoods and cruelties in her wake."
• "How and why are women constantly reshaped by the media into something they aren't? And why can women only be the inspiration in the creative process, rather than the creator? Those questions drove the writing of this book."
• "I don't think anyone has to look too far to think of a woman who's been remolded by the media, by gossip, and by spite into something less than she actually was. It's been happening for centuries, and it happens still. I hope historical novelists in one hundred years time aren't still writing notes like this."

Women, the role of women, the standards applied to women in a patriarchy, and the pressures on women have been and continue to be a universal conversation.

This book presents these themes through the intertwined stories of these three generations. Research shows that Mizza was an actual, historical figure, but the other two are fiction. Mizza Bricard is said to have been the Christian Dior's muse! The book sets the story in the high pressure and high stakes arena of couture fashion, which is art but also business.

To some extent, Astrid and Blythe's stories are about breaking away from the past and creating a name for themselves. For Blythe, it is also about the childhood trauma of her mother's disappearance and abandonment. Given the time in history, Mizza's story is also one of war, survival, and resistance. To a greater extent, the central theme is about a woman surviving and thriving in a male-dominated industry. 

Given the three timelines, it takes a while to settle into the story and keep straight which characters belong in which timelines especially as the older characters carry forward into the subsequent generation. However, the three main characters are each unique and each the anchor to their own story. 

The lifestyle of the rich is not relatable, and I can certainly do without the scenes of sexual encounters. I find the insight into the fashion industry really interesting, and, as a woman, the three main characters and their struggles are relatable, making this a memorable read.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

Under the Tamarind Tree

Title:  Under the Tamarind Tree

Author:  Nigar Alam

Publication Information:  GP Putnam's Sons. 2023. 320 pages.

ISBN:  0593544072 / 978-0593544075

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Rating:   ★★★★

Opening Sentence:  "Nine-year-old Rozeena stared ahead, squinting in the dark at the hordes of shouting people racing towards her family."

Favorite Quote:  "Like the powerful waves that must reach the shore and crash onto the beach, the past too must bubble up from within us, up and out through our lips. We must speak of it instead of allowing the pressure to build inside."

The author's note provides the historical context for this book. "Like Rozeena's family, both my parents' families crossed the border into Pakistan at the time of Partition. After celebrating independence, they joined the millions of people who migrated, who were displaced, who ran and became refugees. But historical facts and numbers, however horrific the scale, don't convey the true human impact, the life-altering consequences, and the trauma that ripples through generations. It's the personal stories that speak to us." In the five weeks prior to the departure of the British from the area, one individual was given the task of dividing the region into nations. Without knowledge of the areas and settlements, the Radcliffe Line came to be. This led to violence, devastation, and mass migrations as the families left India for Pakistan and vice versa.

Even with its dual timelines, this story is not of Partition itself, but the roots of it begin with that time and the refugees who came to Karachi and settled there as neighbors. The bonds and secrets of that time carry forward through the generations to impact the present. "Sometimes, many times, it is the unexpected, the tragic, that determines the direction of our lives."

This book is truly Rozeena's story. She is a nine-year-old at the time of partition. She is a young woman in the 1960s, as she struggles to define her responsibility to her family and her own role as a physician and an independent woman. "Shouldn't it matter which people are doing the talking? If it's people I don't care for, then why should I worry? I have to do what's right ... I can't only do what's expected. There got to be some balance, you know." In the present, she is retired, a mother, a mentor, and still the fiercely independent woman she has always been.

Surrounding Rozeena are family and friends. The childhood loss is of home, city, and especially the death of her brother due to the violence surrounding Partition. The story of the 1960s is of economic divides, friendship, responsibility, love, and a reckoning of all she believes of her life. The story of the present is a chance to reframe that past. Perhaps the chain of trauma and secrets can be set right for the next generations. "In her youth she hadn't known that excess could be a problem too. Just as a plant can drown in too much water, people can lose themselves in too much comfort, too much ease."

The story is narrated through "then" and "now." The history of Partition is brought out in the reliving of memories and the loss of her brother that has determined the direction of Rozeena's life. The "then" is the story of Rozeena and her friends as life altering decisions change the dreams of what might have been. The "now " is the reuniting of the friends that remain. "Some things happen because events align in  such a way to make them happen ... Sometimes there was a clear guilty party, but ... Sometimes, some things just happen. That's all. What you can control now is how you react to that awful, dreadful, tragic thing that happened."

I did guess most of the conclusion of this book. A couple of things about the events during Partition and the fate of one character seemed to come out of nowhere and seem unnecessary. The pace of the book is also slow and melodious but seems to pick up all of a sudden to the conclusion. Nevertheless, the characters of Rozeena and young Zara and the story unfolding keep me engaged. Given that this is a debut novel, I look forward to what Nigar Alam writes next. 

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

The Full Moon Coffee Shop

Title:  The Full Moon Coffee Shop

Author:  Mai Mochizuki (Author), Jesse Kirkwood (Translator).

Publication Information:  Ballantine Books. 2024. 240 pages.

ISBN:  0593726820 / 978-0593726822

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "It was early April and my apartment windows were wide open."

Favorite Quote:  "Even now, I still wonder what could have been if I'd been more honest with myself. I was determined to teach those kids never to shy away from being themselves."

A maneki-neko or beckoning cat can often be found displayed in Japanese households and shops. It is said to bring good luck. The earliest folklore related to this tradition dates from the 1600s. This and subsequent folktales tell of good fortune coming from following, befriending, or doing good for a cat. The good fortune follows the good deed.

This book carries that idea much further. Cats are the feature of a magical coffee shop. Individuals in need of direction find themselves invited to the cafe. In the process, they find lessons for their own life and the direction they seek. However, the invitation is extended to only a few select people. Why?

In this way, the book reminds me of another translation, What You are Looking for is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama. The main character in that book is a librarian who seems to place exactly the right book at exactly the right time in the hands of exactly the right person. The tale appears at the beginning as almost a set of short stories about unrelated people. Slowly, connections emerge, linking the dots into a whole. The book becomes lesson on growth, transformation, and inspiration. Each individual who is pointed to a story is transformed. For some, it leads them to new paths and gives them the courage to pursue them.

This book proceeds in a similar fashion. The cafe appears only to certain people, at a different time, and in a different place. This cafe has no menu. Drinks and snacks are specifically chosen for the individual. The ambiance of cafe seems tailored to the individual also. Some trigger memories. Other trigger longings. Each leaves the recipient changed. The cafe purveyors - the cats - use their knowledge of the individual and their study of astrological charts to provide insight that change the life of each person.

What adds further interest as a reader is discovering what connects these middle aged individuals - a scriptwriter, a TV producer, an actress, a hairdresser and a tech and security engineer. What determines who gets an invitation to the cafe? The connection goes back to their childhood and a kindness done.

This book requires the suspension of disbelief - magical cafes, astral charts, cats who speak and do other things. However, for the kind lessons it teaches, I willingly go along. In a world with much negativity, it is wonderful to see a reminder of the vast impacts a seemingly small act of kindness can have.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

The House is on Fire

Title:  The House is on Fire

Author:  Rachel Beanland

Publication Information:  Simon & Schuster. 2023. 384 pages.

ISBN:  1982186143 / 978-1982186142

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "Sally Campbell's shoes are fashionable but extremely flimsy."

Favorite Quote:  "But now he realizes that all any of these documents are is words, and not even very mysterious words. Words like free and rights and liberty. How can it be that so few words, scratched on a a piece of letter paper, are what's separating Sara and him from a life of freedom?"

On December 26, 1811, during a performance at a theater in Richmond, Virginia, a candle chandelier was raised with the flames still lit. The lit flame touched a scene piece, starting a fire. The entire theater burned down. Seventy two people - 54 women and 18 men died. At least 6 were black or multiracial. It was the largest loss of life in a disaster in the country's history at the time.

This book creates a fictional story with historical figures and this fire. The author's note states, "I ultimately chose to center my story on the lives of four people who experienced the first firsthand and were, in one way or another, forever changed by it. The characters of Gilbert, Jack, Sally, and Cecily are all based on real people who lived and breathed, although we know considerable more bout some of them than others."

Gilbert Hunt is a slave. He becomes a hero in the fire saving the lives of many. Through his eyes, we see the history of slavery and atrocities of that, even as he is deemed a hero.

Jack is young stagehand. In the story, he is the one to raise the chandelier. Through his eyes, we see the how people look to manipulate the truth about the fire to suit their own purposes regardless of who suffers because of those lies. His reckoning is whether he will stand for the truth regardless of the danger that presents to him.

Sally is a young widow, who shows courage during and after fire. She is responsible saving many lives and for forcing a reckoning of what a disproportionate number of women died as compared to men. "Well, weren't we promised that if we married well, we would be taken care of? That our futures would be secure? Where is the security in a husband who would sooner climb over you than help you to your feet?" Per the author's note, "family legend places Patrick Henry's daughter, sally Henry Campbell, in the theater the night of the fire."

Cecily is an enslaved young woman, who accompanies her mistress to the theater. She survives the fire and then sees the opportunity that survival presents. It may be her one chance to escape the abuse she has suffered all her life. But at what price?

Through these four perspectives, the author weaves a compelling story of a preventable disaster, its aftermath, its heroes, and its villains. It also paints a vivid picture of a time and place - slavery, the role of women, the role of artists and performers, and the city itself.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

River Sing Me Home

Title:  River Sing Me Home

Author:  Eleanor Shearer

Publication Information:  Berkley. 2023. 336 pages.

ISBN:  0593548043 / 978-0593548042

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "The soil on the island was fertile, but everything laid down shallow roots."

Favorite Quote:  "Mary Grace lifted her eyes to the sky, perhaps to where she felt her God would be. Rachel did the same, even though she did not believe in a sky-god. She felt that if any god or gods existed, they would be diffused throughout everything and everyone on earth, neither benevolent nor malign, but simply existing, drawing everything together, living and dead."

The Emancipation Act of 1834 has come into being in Barbados. On that day, the master of the plantation announces that though, they may no longer be slaves, all the former slaves are now apprentices. They must must work for him for another six years to pay for their freedom before they can leave. "Freedom is just another name for the life they have always lived."

Rachel is a slave on the Providence plantation. One by one, her children either died or were sold away. Rachel is a mother. What comes next for her? Apprenticeship? Continuation of life as it has always been, just with a different title? Rachel runs, the call of freedom and the glimmer of hope driving her while fear follows her every decision. "She shielded herself from the world as best she could. Every time she saw white skin, her hands would tremble. This was the read power of slavery, the long shadow it could cast after its formal end - that even with all this distance between her and Providence, Rachel still lived in fear."

Freedom, hope, and fear are the themes of the book, not just for Rachel for all whom she encounters and all that she discovers about the lives of her children:

• "Every freedom had its price."
• "This is why me don't like to do it... Think about the past. The memories too painful. The hope hurt. All I want to do is live the life in front of me, because it's a miracle me make it here."
• "Hope hurts."
• "Hope led you to dream things that could not be, like freedom wrestled from the white man's unwilling hands, or a family reunited."
• "Freedom mean something different to me. The search, that is freedom."

Rachel travels far in her search. To some extent, her story and the fate of each of her children becomes symbolic of the experiences of so many - those who died or were killed, those who found safety, those who made unthinkable compromises to survive, and those who continue the search.

Reading this story as that of one family cause me to ponder the connections and convenient segways that allow Rachel the path she follows. However, reading it as symbolic allows me to put aside the coincidences and rather focus on the different paths each individual story takes and the immense loss and tragedy. Ultimately, this is story of a mother's love and the lengths to what that love will go and sacrifice to protect and save her children.

Please share your thoughts and leave a comment. I would love to "talk" to you.

Brotherless Night

Title:  Brotherless Night

Author:  V. V. Ganeshananthan

Publication Information:  Random House. 2023. 368 pages.

ISBN:  0812997158 / 978-0812997156

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "I recently sent a letter to a terrorist I used to know."

Favorite Quote:  "Tell the UN, tell the Red Cross, tell the newspapers that we are dying, they said. What was it like? Oh, they told us, we die on the beach. We die in the sea, swimming for rescue, and we die in the sand. We dig bunkers for shelter and they becomes graves. Our bodies bleed and shatter and burn. We are leaving our elders and children behind us."

Sri Lanka is a small island nation in the Indian Ocean off the coast of India. Geographically, Sri Lanka is only about 25,000 square miles - a little bit larger than the state of West Virginia; its population in about 20 million people - about the population of the state of New York.

The biggest ethnic population in Sri Lanka is the Sinahala. The largest minority is the Tamil. According to legend, the Sinhala claim to be descendants from the earliest settlers of Sri Lanka. The Tamil claim an equally long history in Sri Lanka. The two groups are divided religiously and ethnically.

Sri Lanka became an independent nation in 1948 with the departure of the British control from the Indian subcontinent. Since that time, the relations between the Sinhala and the Tamil have been strained. Riots have occurred throughout the nation's short history, with the Tamil working for an independent homeland and the Sinhala working to keep government control.

In 1983, the country went into Civil War - the government and army representing the Sinhala, and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (the Tamil Tigers) representing the Tamil nationalist interests. Black July is the name given to a pogrom in 1983, where thousands died and many more were injured and even more were left homeless.

This is the story of Black July and its aftermath. It is the story of how extremism grows and takes root on all sides of a political dialogue. It is the story of how the divides becomes larger and larger. It is the story of a young girl - Shashikala - and her brothers. It is the story of how her family's life turns into a "brotherless" night.

Told through the voice of Shahikala, the book talks directly to the reader with a repeated refrain of you must understand:

• "Imagine the places you grew up, the places you studied, places that belonged to your people, burned. But I should stop pretending that I know you. Perhaps you do n to have to imagine. Perhaps your library too, went up in smoke."
• "The unholy, untranslatable fear. You tell yourself that you are prepared, but then the terror rises inside you."
• "I want you to understand: it does not matter if you cannot imagine the future. Still, relentless, it comes."
• "You want to go on in some sort of peaceful life, but there was never a peaceful life. That was a myth."
• "You are thinking, as anyone would, as everyone has, at least in passing. about what you would have done. If I were in his shoes, I would never, you have said to yourself; or perhaps you are sure you would have done exactly the same. There is no way to know, truly, without standing where we did."
• "You must understand: there is no single day on which a war begins. The conflict will collect around you gradually ... You will not even be able to see yourself in the gathering crowd of those who would kill you."
• "Perhaps you know all of this already; perhaps I am telling you a story you already understand. What I wouldn't give for that to be true! But we both know it isn't."
• "Whose stories will you believe? For how long will you listen? Tell me why you think you are here, and that will."

As with Island of a Thousand Mirrors, this book leaves a lasting impact. Reading it at this moment in history perhaps magnifies the impact as these tragic words continue to resonate in conflicts around the world. Despite the repeated pleas for understanding, we do not understand.

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Empire of Ice and Stone

Title:  Empire of Ice and Stone:  The Disastrous and Heroic Voyage of the Karluk

Author:  Buddy Levy

Publication Information:  St. Martin's Press. 2022. 400 pages.

ISBN:  1250274443 / 978-1250274441

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "In early September 1912, a sinewy, sun-seared, elfish-looking man disembarked a steamer at the Port of Seattle with stunning news He encountered a previously unknown tribe of red-haired, blue-eyed, light-skinned 'Eskimos' of Scandinavian origin who'd never seen another white person."

Favorite Quote:  "In the end, Captain Robert Abram Bartlett, ice pilot and master mariner, remains the hero of the Karluk saga, and Vilhjalmur Stefanson its villain."

The Kurluk was one ship - the flagship - in an Arctic expedition in the early 1900s. The ship and its crew met a tragic end; nearly half of those aboard died after the ship became trapped in ice on its way to meet up with the rest of the expedition at Herschel Island.

This book is truly the story of two men. Canadian Vilhjalmur Stefannson was the leader and the planner of the trip. Robert Bartlett was the captain of the Karluk. The difference in outlook, leadership, and actions of these two men is the key to this story.

Shortly after the ship became trapped in ice, Vilhjalmur Stefannson left the ship, ostensibly to hunt for food and to seek help. He never looked back. When he reached a safe point, he went on to pursue his own objectives, leaving the Karluk and its remaining crew to fend for itself.

Robert Barlett, on the other hand, remained with the ship and crew until the ship sank. He ten led a march across the ice to seek help. Weather prevented rescue. However, eventually 14 crew members were rescue.

History has had differing opinions on the decisions of these two men. Read this telling and see what you think. This book offers a very clear opinion.

The book presents much detail about the set up of the expeditions, explaining where care was taken and where it was not. It describes the backgrounds of some of the key team members and what led them to join the mission aboard the Karluk. The details of life on the water and survival on the ice conjure vivid images that place me on board that ship. The mundane details of day to day life. The threat of fire. The lack of food. The idea of drifting where the ice takes you with no control over your direction or destination.

The descriptions of the interactions - teamwork, arguments, and fights - among the crew are a case study in group behavior, especially in close quarters and such dire circumstances. The book also tells of the other heroes and villains of this expedition beyond the two men primarily remembered by history. The research for this book, to my knowledge, was done through notebooks, journals, and archives. The book, however, includes conversations and dialogue. It is unclear how that is created, but, to my guess, it is created, turning this history into a story. It makes for much easier reading.

Perhaps most fascinating of all are the book's descriptions of the Artic conditions - the ice and the weather.  To me, the ice itself is as much a character of this history as any human being. For all the horror this expedition goes through, the descriptions of the ice are stark and beautiful in their own way. It is a reminder of the power of nature and the importance of human beings to always be mindful of that power.

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Days of Wonder

Title:  Days of Wonder

Author:  Caroline Leavitt

Publication Information:  Algonquin Books. 2023. 320 pages.

ISBN:  164375128X / 978-1643751283

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley and a publisher's blog tour free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "Ella stepped through the prison gate, blinded by the sun and the hard blue of the sky, frantically searching the crowd for her mother."

Favorite Quote:  "Her mother used to tell her the the most important forgiveness was God's, but to get it you had to first get the forgiveness of the person you had wounded. You had to ask once, then twice, and then a third time, and if you weren't forgiven by the person, then God, at least would forgive you."

***** BLOG TOUR *****

Review

"I still look back in wonder at that summer." The "days of wonder" in this book are a summer in which young love begins, a family forms, a dispute occurs, and it all ends in tragedy. Fast forward several years. A young woman is released from prison. A mother tries to hold on and define who she is without the family unit. A young man discovers truths he has long not seen. 

Ella and Jude meet in school. Young puppy love or something much stronger? Either way, they both create a world onto themselves. Jude's father does not approve. Ella's mother somewhat does not or does in an effort to be part of the glow of their relationship and to maintain the family she longs for. She has her own history, having been disowned by her Hasidic Jewish family for what they considered an unforgivable sin. It has always been Helen and Ella. Now, she thinks it is to be Helen, Ella, and Jude.

As the book description states, Ella is accused of attempted murder of Jude's father. She is sent to prison. She is pregnant, and the baby is given up for adoption. What truly happened that night? Where did Jude go? Why did he never return?

Six year later, Ella finds herself out of prison and heading to Ann Arbor, where she thinks her daughter may be. Ann Arbor brings the baby's adoptive family and the issues there that Ella finds herself involved in. In addition, the shadow of her past haunts her. In addition, her relationship with her mother shifts as they both navigate this world.

Ultimately, this melodramatic story is about the women - Helen, Ella, Marianna, and even Angie (you have to read to find out who Angie is). It is about the sacrifices and the struggle to define a life, each for themselves. Helen, who now has the opportunity to define herself beyond the scared single mother abandoned by her family. Ella, who went to jail as a child and emerges as a women haunted by the past but looking for a future. Mairanna, whose marriage is not what she thought it was. Angie, who finds her love to have a past buried in secrets. It is also the story of a young man, who makes a tragic mistake as a child which is then exacerbated by abuse from an unforgiving father. As a result, the boy grows into a man who perhaps cannot forgive himself.

The book is melodramatic. However, the relationships, particularly of mother with daughter, are explored with care and ring true. The grief Helen, Ella, and Marianna suffer at the hands of the "system" and of the people in their lives rings true. The idea of forgiveness - for others, from others, for ourselves, and from ourselves rings true. For me, this is a memorable story.

About the Book

New York Times bestselling author Caroline Leavitt returns with a tantalizing, courageous story about mothers and daughters, guilt and innocence, and the lengths we go for love.

As a teenager, for a moment, Ella Fitchburg found love—yearning, breathless love—that consumed both her and her boyfriend, Jude, as they wandered the streets of New York City together. But her glorious life was pulled out from beneath her after she was accused of trying to murder Jude’s father, an imperious superior court judge. When she learns she’s pregnant shortly after receiving a long prison sentence, she reluctantly decides to give up the child.

Ella is released from prison after serving only six years and is desperate to turn the page on a new life, but she can’t seem to let go of her past. With only an address as a possible lead, she moves to Ann Arbor, Michigan, determined to get her daughter back. Hiding her identity and living in a constant state of deception, she finds that what she’s been searching for all along is a way to uncover—and live with—the truth. Yet a central mystery endures: neither Jude nor Ella can remember the events leading up to the attempted murder—that fateful night which led to Ella’s conviction.

For fans of Miranda Cowley Heller’s The Paper Palace and Allegra Goodman’s Sam, Caroline Leavitt’s Days of Wonder is a gripping high-drama page-turner about the elusive nature of redemption and the profound reach of love.

About the Author

Caroline Leavitt is the award-winning author of twelve novels, including the New York Times bestseller Pictures of You and Is This Tomorrow. A book critic for People magazine, her essays, articles and stories have been included in New York magazine, “Modern Love” in the New York Times, Salon, and The Daily Beast, among others. The recipient of a New York Foundation of the Arts Award for Fiction and a Sundance Screenwriters Lab finalist, she is also the co-founder of A Mighty Blaze.

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The Winter Garden

Title:  The Winter Garden

Author:  Nicola Cornick

Publication Information:  Graydon House. 2022. 336 pages.

ISBN:  1525811460 / 978-1525811463

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "They awoke that morning to snow."

Favorite Quote:  "It cannot always be a fight. Sometimes we must be content to bide a little and wait for our time to come around again."

As with Nicola Cornick's other books, The Winter Garden is a story of multiple time periods and the women of the time struggling, fighting, and making their own way. In the present day, Lucy has lost her career and her way of life to a disease. She is at a crossroads because everything she worked for her whole life and everything she dreamed of is gone. She retreats to her aunt's home in Oxfordshire to rest and recover physically and emotionally. The home has its own history, and a project is underway to restore and recover part of that history - a garden lost to time.

The history of the past is of the 1600s. The Catholics of the region felt persecuted by the Protestant kings and queens. There was religious strife which led to political strife. "Matters of religion were a thorny thicket for a man - or woman - to discuss with their fellows. The past fifty years had made us wary. Wars had been waged, men of conscience killed, families such as ours split apart, imprisoned, robbed of our fortunes." Robert Catesby was a Catholic landowner and a ringleader of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a failed plan to blow up the King and other nobleman on the opening day of Parliament. The holiday called Guy Fawkes (another of conspirators) Night or Bonfire Night still celebrates the failure of this plot.

In the story, Lucy's aunt's home once belonged to Robert Catesby. For the book, the main character of the past is Robert Catesby's mother although the garden is question was actually created at the request of his Protestant wife. Robert Catesby's wife plays a major role in the book, and yet it is not her story that is told. 

The book proceeds somewhat like an archeological dig with a visiting ghost and visions and some of romance added. As Lucy experiences visions of the past and gets involved in the restoration project, her visions and discovery lead to that layers of the story of the past. The story of the present is one of healing; the story of the past is one of destruction. The anchor of the book is very much Lucy's story of grief and healing. The romance in the book is a sweet one and enough in the background to allow the story to remain focused on the history and its ramifications into the present.

This book, yet again, does what I love about historical fiction. It teaches me something new in history. I read the story and am off to search nonfiction sources for the actual history. I have, of course, heard of Guy Fawkes and Bonfire Night. However, I had never before heard of Robert Catesby and his role in this history. The fact that the fiction is from the perspective of the women leaves me wondering of the actual women of this history and if anything is written of their roles and contributions.

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The Force of Such Beauty

Title:  The Force of Such Beauty

Author:  Barbara Bourland

Publication Information:  Dutton. 2022. 400 pages.

ISBN:  0593329341 / 978-0593329344

Rating:   ★★★★

Book Source:  I received this book through NetGalley free of cost in exchange for an honest review.

Opening Sentence:  "The last time they caught me at the airport, I panicked."

Favorite Quote:  "All fairy tales serve the same purpose. One woman's story, told to warn the others. Here is how I lost my feet here is how I lost my voice; here is how I lost my children. Here is the moment I was given from my father to my husband. Here is where the danger lies: the man with the blue beard, the urge in the forest, the tricky gentleman, the lying merchant, the prince in the tower. Fairy tales are not about sparkling shoes or white cats. They are about the ribbons that adorn, then, sever your neck."

The author's note expresses what this book attempts to capture. "For a real-life woman sitting across from a prince, the princess story skips the middleman and marries you directly to the state itself. It's logical. It's rational. It's the desire for a better life. And what could be more human than that? There will always be princesses. Yet - what must it take to spend each day tow steps behind your partner, always in shadow? What must it take from you to discard yourself - modernity, even - in exchange for the illusion of safety? In the case of this book's narrator, Caroline Muller, it takes everything."

Caroline Muller is an athlete, an Olympian, a medalist. Her entire life has been about running. Her elite athlete status has led a to privileged and sheltered life. Everything revolves around her career, and everyone revolves around her, the star. An accident ends her career. With it, life as she has ever known it ends. She is cast adrift, no longer the star or the center of attention. "I learned that the world was made from men - for me - that men controlled the world, and further - that their desire for my attention was the only leverage I possessed." A chance meeting and a series of events lead her to marry Prince Ferdinand Fieschi of Lucomo, her literal prince charming. "It isn't until you feel safe that you realize how difficult  it was before, when you were constantly afraid, as though you have been hearing a noise in the background for so long that you cannot pick it out until someone turns it off. And when you hear the sound of silence, it's sweeter than you knew anything could be."

Sadly, Caroline discovers that her happily-ever-after is not quite so happy for her even in an amazingly beautiful setting in the lap of luxury as a literal princess. "The force of such beauty is meant to destabilize a person. I was no exception." The book description captures that and the book begins with the fact that Caroline tries to run away. This is not the first time. Perhaps, not the last either. The parallels of some of the details of Caroline's story to those of the lives of real princesses is obvious and clear. This book presents the picture that tarnishes the image of the charmed life of a princess. It brings out the rules, the requirements, and the constraints of royal life. It paints a very sad picture. 

The aspect of the book that is perhaps even more fascinating for being unexpected is the view on South African history and politics. Caroline Muller is a runner and from South Africa. "Running was the only sport that could not be segregated by the government, could not be kept down by oppression, could not be bought out from under the feet of my peers. They could not, you see - they could not segregate the roads. Not during the day, anyway." Caroline and her friend and fellow runner Zola have very different experiences as runner and go on to lead very different lives. They stay connected in some way throughout this book, and, time and again, the realities of and changes in South Africa become a fascinating part of the story of the European princess.

A memorable story. Given recent news and requests for privacy, this book takes on a whole new meaning and relevance..

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