Book: The Briar Club

 Book: The Briar Club

Author: Kate Quinn

Pages: 432

This is my 5th read for the year

What Amazon says:

Washington, DC, 1950.  Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a donw-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation's capital where secrets hide behind white picket fences.  But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic room, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss, whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; policeman's daughter Nora, who finds herself entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Beatrice, whose career has come to an end along with the women's baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy's Red Scare.  Grace's weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun teac become a healing  balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own.  When a shocking act of violence tears the house apart, the Briar Club women must decide once and for all: who is the true enemy in their midst?

This was a great book.  I read it in a few short days  - finding all kinds of time to keep reading instead of doing anything else.  The characters are well developed and I loved that each character got their own chapter so we learned their backstory and how they came to be at the boarding house.  Grace was my favorite character - how she took a so-so situation and turned it into a home bringing every character (even Arlene in the end) into the fold of what it is to be in a found family.  The story flowed nicely, and the ending wasn't all that surprising, but that didn't take away from anything.  And I liked the long author's note at the end where she explains where she got the inspriation throughout history for her characters.  Another great Kate Quinn read.

Stars: 5

Book: The Secret History

 Book: The Secret History

Author: Donna Tartt

Pages: 576

This is my 4th read for the year

What Amazon says:

Under the influence of a charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at a New England college discover a way of thought and life a world away from their banal contemporaries.  But their search for the transcendent leads them down a dangerous path, beyond human constructs of morality.

This book was just eh.  I cannot quite figure out what all the hype was about - it was boring and dry and I couldn't wait for it to end.

Stars: 2

Book: The Frozen River

 Book: The Frozen River

Author: Ariel Lawhorn

Pages: 448

This is my 3rd read for the year

Amazon says:

Maine, 1789: When the Kennebec River freezes, entombing a man in the ice, Martha Ballard is summoned to examine the body and determine cause of death.  As a midwife and healer, she is privy to much of what goes on behind closed doors in Hallowell.  Her diary is a record of every birth and death, crime and debacle that unfolds in the close-knit community.  Months earlier, Martha documented the details of an elleged rape committed by two of the town's most respected gentlemen - one of whom has now been found dead in the ice.  But when a local physician undermines her conclusion, declaring the death to be an accident, Martha is forced to investigate the shocking murder on her own.  Over the course of one winter, as the trial nears, and whispers and prejudices mount, Martha doggedly pursues the truth.  Her diary soon lands at the center of the scandal, implicating those she loves, and compelling Martha to decide where her own loyalties lie.  

This was a great book.  The story was a page turner from the beginning and continued so to the end.  Litte chapter cliff hangers here and there had me putting off doing other things to keep reading.  The writing is well done and the women characters are very likable as are Martha's husband and sons.  The evil man in this book is extremely evil.  It almost makes you cringe.  There is a bit of over explaining of different things, but on the whole - a nicely put together story.  Funny enough -my favorite part of the book was the author's talk at the end of the book where she talks about how she came about writing this book about a real person (Martha Ballard) and making it the most fictionalized version of a real person she has ever done.  It was fascinating and now I must read the biographical book on Martha Ballard to learn about this woman who did deliver over 1000 babies and who was a part of this towns murder and rape trial.

Stars: 4.5

Book: Killers of the Flower Moon

 Book: Killers of the Flower Moon

Author: David Grann

Pages: 416

This is my 2nd book of the year

What Amazon says:

In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma.  After oil was discovered beneath their land, the Osage rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.  Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off.  The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkahrt, became a prime target.  One of her relatives was shot.  Another was poisoned.  And it was just the beginning, as more and more Osage were dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themseles murdered.  As the death toll rose, the newly created FBI took up the case, and the young director, J. EDgar Hoover, turned to the former Texas Ranger named Tom White to try and unravel the mystery.  White put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent who infiltrated the region, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspriacies in American history.

This was a pretty good book.  It is a story I knew nothing about (I have not seen the movie) and the information was facinating and disturbing.  I knew nothing of the murders of the Osage but have heard of the tribe.  It is pretty well written, and informational and educational.  I will say it was a little dry in spots and I found myself having to walk away and come back because the underlining story should be read.  It should be known.  So I am glad I read it.

Stars: 4

Book: James

 Book: James

Author: Percival Everett

Pages: 303

This is my 1st book for the new year

Last year I started to copy the summaries from Amazon because I read so much and it just is a step I don't always want to take to do myself.  I am going to continue that this year.

What Amazon says:

When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan.  Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own deather to escape his violent father, recently returned to town.  As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and too-often-unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.  

I thought this was a great book.  I read it over the course of 2 days because I found it an interesting and easy read.  I liked that James was basically two people - a person who whites thought was an uneducated slave and the one where he speaks intelligently and knowledgable.  It allowed me to give good thought to how it might have been for a lot of slaves of this time period.  I thought the writing was good and James a very likable character.  Two parts brought my review down a star and that was 1) where James is in an accident where a furnace explodes while he is in the room and he is barely injured while others were killed.  2) The ending wrapped up way too quickly.  I would have liked more.  Overall - so glad I read it to start 2025.

Stars: 4

Book: Moneychanger

 Book: Moneychanger

Author: Arthur Hailey

Pages: 400

This is my 250th book for the year

What Amazon says:

Ben Roselli, president of First Mercantile American Bank and grandson of the founder, makes the shocking announcement that he's dying.  With no offspring to inherit the company, Roselli knows that executive VPs Roscoe Heyward and Alex Vandervoort are the obvious candidates to succeed him.  Heyward, who has been with First Mercantile for 2 decades, will do whatever it takes to bring in new clients and win the coveted presidency.  Vandervoort, a newcomer from the Federal Reserve with a left-wing girlfriend, advocates for a socially responsible plan of growth.  And now the discovery of counterfeit case and credit card fraud threatens the future of the bank itself.  

This was a decent book.  Mat got it for me for Christmas because it was the 2nd most popular book in 1975 (the year I was born.  Last year he got me the most popular).  The writing was decent and the story intriguing.  It held my interest.  I would say the negative was that over explaining that occured in the book.  The writer over explained things that weren't that complicated and it made those sections skipable.  Otherwise, I enjoyed it.

Stars: 3

Book: Klaus (Graphic Novel)

 Book: Klaus (Graphic Novel)

Author: Grant Morrison

Pages: 202

This is my 249th read for the year

This is a fantastic adaptation of the Santa Claus tale. It is a story of how Klaus becomes Santa Claus but told in a story that is more for middle grade and above.  It is artistic and well written and I enjoyed this quick read.

Stars: 4