March-April Books

*Miller’s Valley by Anna Quindlen portrays the demise of a Pennsylvania farm, the family that has owned it for generations, most of the family members and a way of life. As she matures from precocious youngster to purposeful young woman, Mimi comes to terms with life as it should be versus life as it is. She may manage enough grit, determination and intelligence to adapt and find her own definition of success and happiness.

**A Doubter’s Almanac by Ethan Canin is “a compelling family saga that follows troubled math genius Milo Andret from birth to death”. Milo goes from inauspicious beginnings in rural Michigan to solving a decades-old mathematical problem and teaching at Princeton. He destroys a promising career because of alcoholism and womanizing. The second half of the novel is told by his son, who inherits many of the same skills and problems. In addition to the engaging prose, “the novel is a subtle meditation on creativity, happiness, and fate." Canin's ability to explain complex mathematics and the minds of truly brilliant people is impressive.

*Ronald Reagan by Jacob Weisberg is an even-handed, balanced, brief and bracing portrait of America's fortieth president and the ideas that animated his political career and make him arguably the 2^nd most influential president of the 20^th century. "He didn't suffer from anxiety or self-doubt. The search for something beneath the surface has tended to produce few results."

**The Lucky Years: How to Thrive in the Brave New World of Health by bestselling physician David Agus presents numerous fascinating scientific morsels—such as parabiosis (anatomically connecting two living creatures) and CRISPR (a tool for editing the genome). Agus recommends a daily aspirin and statin drug, envisions the smartphone as both a health diary and a "virtual personal therapist," and even suggests that individuals consider banking their plasma.  He argues for a scientific and Zen-like approach to wellness that emphasizes listening to your body's signals, measuring and tracking important numbers (blood pressure, activity, weight, sleep), trusting your intuition, and keeping active.

*The Travelers by Chris Pavone has travel writer Will Rhodes being seduced and then coerced into a series of covert operations.  As he jets around the world (from a chateau in Bordeaux to a midnight raid on a Paris mansion, from a dive bar in Dublin to a mega-yacht in the Mediterranean and an isolated cabin perched on the rugged cliffs of Iceland), he begins to suspect that his firm and his wife might also be hiding secrets that could upend (or just end) his life.

**The Industries of the Future by Alec Ross, former Senior Advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, identifies immerging innovations while making strategic recommendations for taking advantage of opportunities in such fields as robotics, cybersecurity, genomics and digital technology.  Google’s Erick Schmidt says Ross “can see patterns in the chaos and guidance for the road forward. He has an unusual diversity of expertise that allows him to apply multiple lenses to the world's challenges. Despite good writing and excellent mastery of complex subjects, the book is heavy going at times.

The Road to Little Dribbling:  Adventures of an American in Britain by Bill Bryson is a twenty-year follow-up to his charming, funny, insightful Notes from a Small Island. Regrettably,  I thought it possessed little of the characteristics that first made me a Bryson fan, and I didn’t finish the book.

January-February Books

            

*The Crossing by Michael Connelly has Harry Bosch coming out of a retirement forced by enemies within the LAPD to help his half-brother (The Lincoln Lawyer) defend a client whose DNA was found on a rape/murder victim. Perhaps the client has been framed for murder, so Bosch secretly teams up with former partner Lucia Soto to investigate possible corruption inside the LAPD. While not his best effort, nobody does procedural details better than Connelly.

*A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler takes us across three generations of the Whitshanks, their shared stories and long-held secrets, “all the unguarded and richly lived moments that combine to define who and what they are as a family." Abby and Red are growing older and it is time to make decisions about how best to look after them, and the future of the house so lovingly built by Red's father. After 50 years as a writer, Tyler still has the talent, wisdom and patience to turn out an excellent book.

I Am My Own Wife by Doug Wright is the script for the acclaimed one-man show exploring the true story of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, a transvestite and celebrated antiques dealer who successfully navigated the two most oppressive regimes of the past century, the Nazis and the Communists. I had trouble following the print version of the play, but in the Ensemble’s production, John Tufts flawlessly navigated the 30 roles and make it understandable and enjoyable. 

*The Expatriates by Janice Y. K. Lee is the story of how a traumatized college graduate, a lonely housewife and a burned-out mother of three endure the challenges of their respective demons and families in the face of unexpected consequences within their American expat community in Hong Kong…” a beautiful, transporting novel about motherhood, marriage, and friendship.”

Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know by cognitive psychologist Alexandra Horowitz introduces the reader to dogs’ perceptual and cognitive abilities and then draws a picture of what it might be like to be a dog. Imagine being able to smell every bit of open food in the house as well as sadness in humans. Sometimes a little slow going, but Scarlett asked me to read this so I could be more understanding of her needs.

Marry, Kiss, Kill by Anne Flett-Giordano sounded like a great concept: a Santa Barbara murder mystery set during the Film Festival written by a successful TV writer and the pick of a Graduates book club. It could have been good, but wasn’t.   The local color was okay, but characters were one-dimensional and as lovable as Ted Cruz, the plot unbelievable and the dialogue too clever by half.

*Saving Sophie by Ronald H. Balson is about an ordinary attorney from Chicago-until his wife dies, his young daughter is kidnapped, and he becomes the main suspect in an $88-million-dollar embezzlement case. Jack is on the run, hoping to rescue his daughter from her maternal grandfather (a suspected terrorist in Palestine) before he is arrested.   Balson writes an engaging story with believable characters and even weaves some well-done history of the Israel-Palestinian history.

Rogue Lawyer by John Grisham is the popular writer’s alternative to The Lincoln Lawyer. Sebastian Rudd works out of a customized bulletproof van, a heavily armed driver who is also his body guard and paralegal. He takes on clients other lawyers won't even consider: a drug-addled, tattooed kid rumored to be in a satanic cult, who is accused of molesting and murdering two little girls; a vicious crime lord on death row; a homeowner arrested for shooting at a SWAT team that mistakenly invaded his house.  While not his best work, this is vintage Grisham and an enjoyable read.

The Guilty by David Baldacci is the 4^th novel about government assassin Will Robie that  “straddles that line of edgy, high-concept suspense, augmented with a bit of the political thriller, and deep character studies.” Collateral damage in an assignment impacts Will’s legendary skills and he takes a leave to help his estranged father who has been indicted for murder in Texas. This a different tack for Daldacci, has a more personal, introspective tone but is still engaging.

November-December Books

The Avenue of Mysteries by John Irvine is a “sprawling, imaginative tale about a writer whose life’s journey has all the qualities of a modern Dickens novel.”  Irvine is a talented writer but this is far from his best book.  I haven’t been able to finish it but will try again next year.

*X by Sue Grafton is “Perhaps her darkest and most chilling novel.” Featuring a sociopathic serial killer who leaves no trace of his crimes. Kinsey Millhone quickly identifies the killer but take some time to review past cases, reintroduce the loveable characters in her circle and drop a few almost current tidbits about Santa Barbara before building a case to bring the villain to justice. NPR’s Maureen Corrigan says, “Makes me wish there were more than 26 letters.”

**The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George is a literary apothecary, a floating bookstore in a barge on the Seine where Monsieur Perdu prescribes novels for the problems of life--for everyone except himself. After 20 years of mourning a lost love, Perdu unties his barge and travels along the country’s rivers, dispensing his wisdom and his books with a bestselling but blocked author and a lovelorn Italian chef. “A charming international best seller that believes in the healing properties of fiction, romance, and a summer in the south of France."

The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David Lagercrantz who attempts, unsuccessfully, to pick up the mantle of the late Stieg Larsson. In this follow-up to The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest finds genius-hacker Lisbeth Salander and journalist Mikael Blomkvist teaming up to confront a dangerous new cyber threat to the free world. There’s lots of review of Larsson’s previous books in a lumbering story with the plot being largely developed by long conversations with the key players instead of a description of the events as they unfold.

See Me by Nicolas Sparks, the best male writer of ‘chick lit’ is predictably charming but far from his best effort. Colin Hancock, a young man with a destructive past who is focused on keeping his life on course to become a teacher.  His monis regime of work, study and exercise is challenged by Maria Sanchez, a hardworking lawyer, her immigrant family who is nervous about his tattoos and police record.  Despite attempts by her former lover and a cynical police detective to derail their romance, their inherit goodness prevails.  

*Everybody Rise by Stephanie Clifford is another in this year’s parade of “witty tales about high-society wannabes…” Reminiscent of Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth and the more modern Primates of Park Avenue and Luckiest Girl Alive, NY Times reporter Clifford’s debut is a “relentlessly fascinating story of old money and callous ambition.”  Yes, it is chick lit and beach reading, but still insight and good fun.