Category: Stu’s Reviews

Grade:  B+

Notable People: Nevada Barr

Title:  ” Boar Island”

Review:    The most recent in Barr’s’ 25 year run of Anna Pidgeon books. Anna, the National Park Service Ranger, finds herself temporarily assigned to Acadia National Park, where all kinds of mayhem ensues. I have liked these books for a long time, but this felt a bit repetitive and the characters did not seem fully developed. Barr, who is really an NPS ranger, again goes back to some of the same characters in many of her books, and her sense of place is always wonderful, but this one seemed a bit over the top for me. Still, who doesn’t want to spend a virtual week musing over the great Maine north woods.

Genre: Book   

Grade:  A

Notable People: Louise Penny

Title:  ” A Trick of the Light”

Review:    Penny’s sixth installment in the fabled Gamache series is the best yet. Back to the tiny, magical village of Three Pines- for yet another bizarre murder. But these books are as much philosophy an history as mystery. Personally, I can’t get enough Gamache…an all-time character. And, these booms are not just nice, nice…. they go to very dark human places, before resurfacing. Gamache is a manifestation of the great Maigret of Simenon lore, and Penny pays homage with several references to the beloved Parisian detective in this one. You got to love all things Quebecois right about now.

Genre: Book     

Grade:  B+

Notable People: David Baldacci

Title:  “The Last Mile”

Review:    The second in Baldacci’s Amos Decker series, in which Memory Man Decker (who has perfect photographic recall as a result of football hit in first NFL game that altered his brain) joins the FBI as special civilian and pursues a forty-year-old case to free a man from being executed. Along the way, it tackles church bombings in Alabama and Mississippi in the late 6os and the general state of racism and politics in the South. Well written book that drifted to un- believability at times, but has very strong characters, led by the eccentric and formidable Decker, who you just wanna give a hug.

Genre: Book  

Grade:  A-

Notable People: Louise Penny

Title:  “Bury Your Dead”

Review:    This top notch thriller is the fifth in the masterful Chief Inspector Gamache series, that is all things Quebec. The complicated yarn delves deep into the Quebecois psyche, with a story linked to Samuel de Champlain, the father of Quebec, and the long fight for Francophile separatism. Along the way, there are terrorist attacks, decades and centuries old murders and the wonderful cast of characters Penny continues to evolve. Most of the he book takes place in the old walled Quebec City, a delight of its own, as Gamache takes up residence with his mentor amidst his own crisis of faith. A perfect book for cold winter day and nights.

Genre: Book

Grade:  A

Notable People: Mark Sullivan

Title:  “Beneath a Scarlet Sky”

Review:    Standalone novel from prolific author who often collaborates with James Patterson. This one took me by surprise and knocked me off my feet. Seventeen-year-old Pino Lella is living the life in Milan in 1943, when the Nazis invade and change everything. He becomes a smuggler of Jews across the border to neutral Switzerland, by mountain climbing and skiing in impossible conditions, and then becomes a driver for the Nazi General who is the architect of Italy’s occupation and devastation…. from which he becomes a valuable spy for the Italian resistance and the Allies. The book follows the trajectory of the war in Italy for its last two years until the Nazi surrender. Filled with rich and real historical characters, death-defying treks over the Alps and a moving love story. This is one you will not want to end.