**Kind of Kin by
Arilla Askey deserves the enthusiastic NYT review (nytimes.com/2013/01/27).
When Oklahoma passes a tough "illegals"
law, Robert John Brown is sent to prison for hiding migrant workers. Brown's daughter Sweet Georgia is left to
manage a family (including a troublesome son and an orphaned nephew) that is
coming apart at the seams as her marriage collapses under the stress. Askew’s
treatment of poverty, politics religion, immigration and family
(dis)functionality is masterful, heart-breaking and laugh-out-loud funny at the
same time.
*The Art Forger by
Barbara A. Shapiro’ s razor-sharp writing and plot twists makes this an
absorbing literary thriller that also gives us three centuries of forgers, art thieves, and
obsessive collectors. Claire makes her living reproducing famous paintings for an online retailer. To improve her situation, she is lured into a
Faustian bargain a powerful gallery owner and agrees to forge a painting—one of
the Degas masterpieces stolen from the Gardner Museum—in exchange for a
one-woman show in his renowned gallery. Of course, there are a few wrinkles in
the well-researched and written novel.
The Black Box by
Michael Connelly has LAPD detective, Harry Bosch trying to solve a 20 year old cold
case. Bosh links the bullet from a recent crime to 1992 the killing of a young
female photographer during the L.A. riots.
The new ballistics match indicate that her death was not random
violence, but something connected to a deeper intrigue. Like an investigator
combing through the wreckage after a plane crash, Bosch searches for the
"black box," the one piece of evidence that will pull the case
together. Not Connelly’s best, but still an engaging, quick read.
A Land More Kind than
Home by Wiley Cash is a southern coming of age debut novel about life in an
unassuming mountain town that believes in protecting its own secrets. Jess Hall is plunged into an adulthood for
which he is not prepared when his autistic older brother sneaks a look at
something he isn't supposed to with catastrophic repercussions for his family,
the charismatic, snake-handling minister and the strange sect that follows him
.
*Mortality by
Christopher Hitchens is accurately described as a "courageous, insightful
and candid thoughts on malady and mortality from one of our most celebrated
writers". Hitchens maintains his skepticism about religion and life after
death while chronicling his losing battle with esophageal cancer while writing
columns for Vanity Fair on politics
and culture and also describing his personal
and philosophical view of life and death.
*The Future: Six
Drivers of Global Change by Al Gore is an important, impressive jumble of a book. Gore surveys our planet’s
clouded horizon and offers a sober, learned, and moderately hopeful forecast
“in the visionary tradition of Alvin Toffler’s Future Shock.” The
book reflects great breath of knowledge and research with genuine passion and
commitment, but like the former VP himself, it tends to go on a bit and needed
a firmer editorial hand.
Dark Places by
Gillian Flynn is an engaging mystery but not as well-crafted as her later book,
Gone Girl. For a price, Libby Day
will reconnect with the people involved in the murder of her mother and two
sisters in "The Satan Sacrifice of Kinnakee, Kansas." At seven, she testified that her brother Ben
was the murderer. Now 32 and down on
her luck, she is not so sure as the unimaginable and almost unbelievable truth
emerges. The book shows signs of the talent that emerges in her next novel.
Brown’s Guide to the
Good Life Without Tears, Fears or Boredom by David Brown is pretty well
summarized in the title. The former editor of Cosmopolitan, husband of a
subsequent editor (Helen Gurley Brown) producer and author is wise, witty, and irreverent as reflects on
a life well-lived from his tenth decade. "Helpful, humorous bits of advice
and sage pithy truisms.”
The Carriage House
by Louisa Hall is a “breakthrough debut novel” by the talented daughter of
our neighbors. For three generations, a
carriage house has stood on the Adair property, a symbol of their family’s
place in the world. Now, the house is crumbling, as is the family. After a stroke reduces the patriarch,
daughters Diana,
Elizabeth, and Isabelle take on the battle for the carriage house and a
more functional family dynamic. Ultimately they overcome deep and painful misunderstandings and betrayals to find forgiveness and hope.
