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Accusing Mr. Darcy by Kelly Miller (audio)

March 30, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Audible, 13+ hrs.
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Accusing Mr. Darcy by Kelly Miller, narrated by Stevie Zimmerman, is part romance and part murder-mystery in which Mr. Darcy becomes accused of compromising/attacking Elizabeth Bennet! How can that be? Elizabeth Bennet is visiting her cousin Rose at the Kendall Estate, and Mr. Darcy has come to stay with his friend Nicholas. The husband and wife team of Rose and Nicholas may have ulterior motives for bringing their Elizabeth and Darcy to their home, but it is not to bring them together in matrimony.

Rose has talked up Captain James Kendall to Elizabeth and vice versa, hoping to make a love match between them. Meanwhile, Nicholas has invited several young ladies for Darcy to consider, even as he acknowledged that Darcy erred in his response to Elizabeth at his wedding. Darcy sets about to apologize to her for his friend’s sake, and the road to love is set in motion.

A murder in the Kendall neighborhood causes concern, but when one of the guests is attacked, a former Bow Street runner is called to solve the matter. A budding romance is hampered by the watchful eyes of investigators and men posted to ensure no one else is attacked until the culprit is caught. Miller has paced this novel well, and Elizabeth and Darcy are able to not only overcome miscommunications and prejudices but also work together and learn what it truly means to be partners. Even in a few short weeks, they have found they have more in common than not.

Stevie Zimmerman is as always a stunning narrator. She does well differentiating between the many characters and articulating the scenes to build tension and ensure readers are captivated. Accusing Mr. Darcy by Kelly Miller, narrated by Stevie Zimmerman, is full of romance, sweet moments, and mystery. A definite winner.

***And there’s a horse named Serena!***

RATING: Cinquain

About the Author:

Award-winning author Kelly Miller writes Austenesque Regency romances. Her four published books are “Death Takes a Holiday at Pemberley,” a “Pride & Prejudice” fantasy, winner, Royal Dragonfly Book Awards and Indies Today Book Awards; “Mr. Darcy’s Perfect Match,” a “Pride & Prejudice” variation recommended by the Historical Novel Society; “Accusing Mr. Darcy,” a “Pride & Prejudice” romance/mystery, winner, Firebird book awards and Queer Indie Awards-Ally Division; and “A Consuming Love” a “Pride & Prejudice” novella. Look for “Captured Hearts,” a variation of “Persuasion,” to be released in early 2022. Ms. Miller resides in Silicon Valley with her husband, daughter, and their many pets.

Filed Under: audiobooks, fiction, historical fiction, purchased, Read in 2022, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

1932 by Karen M. Cox (audio)

March 10, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Audiobook, 7+ hrs.
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1932 by Karen M. Cox, narrated by Elizabeth Grace, is set during the Great Depression when economic turmoil upended so many lives and many lost their fortunes. The Bennets are not immune, as Mr. Bennet loses his professorship, forcing the family to leave their comforts of Chicago for Meryton, Kentucky, and Mrs. Bennet’s family farm. The family farm is quite an adjustment, with no bathroom indoors and a farm that hasn’t been very productive.

The Bennets set to work about getting the house in working order. William Darcy, owner of Pemberley, the largest farm in the county, however, has a rich and charmed life where everything is just as he likes it, until the new neighbors force him to take a harder look at his well-ordered life. When he meets Elizabeth Bennet, he is swept up in feelings he is unready for, but he’s unable to express himself in a clear way.

Cox clearly knows these characters well, and she develops them in believable ways for this time period and given the economic circumstances. Darcy is still the caring and somewhat prideful man we all expect him to be, but he’s definitely still a gentleman. Elizabeth is still a willful and spirited woman who wants to help all she loves. The more modern times do lend itself to a little more liberal storyline, especially where Georgiana is concerned.

1932 by Karen M. Cox, narrated by Elizabeth Grace, is a delight and Wickham is even more trying in this modernized story. I loved the dynamic between Elizabeth and Darcy in Cox’s story. I loved that they had to navigate their marriage without understanding that they are “in love.” Don’t miss this Depression-era story.

About the Author:

Karen M Cox is an award-winning author of five full-length novels: 1932, Find Wonder in All Things, I Could Write a Book, Undeceived, and Son of a Preacher Man. She also contributed short stories to several anthologies, including The Darcy Monologues, Dangerous to Know: Jane Austen’s Rakes and Gentlemen Rogues, Rational Creatures, and Elizabeth: Obstinate, Headstrong Girl.

Karen was born in Everett WA, which was the result of coming into the world as the daughter of a United States Air Force Officer. She had a nomadic childhood, with stints in North Dakota, Tennessee, and New York State before finally settling in her family’s home state of Kentucky at the age of eleven. She lives in a quiet town with her husband, where she works as a pediatric speech pathologist, encourages her children, and spoils her granddaughter.

Channeling Jane Austen’s Emma, Karen has let a plethora of interests lead her to begin many hobbies and projects she doesn’t quite finish, but she aspires to be a great reader and an excellent walker—like Elizabeth Bennet.

Filed Under: audiobooks, fiction, historical fiction, purchased, Read in 2022, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

None Shall Sleep by Ellie Marney (audio)

March 8, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Audiobook, 11+ hours
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None Shall Sleep by Ellie Marney, narrated by Christine Lakin, Maxwell Hamilton, Zach Villa, and Jake Abel, was a recommendation from LittleMissStar and it was a thrilling ride. Emma Lewis and Travis Bell are recruited by the FBI to conduct interviews of convicted juvenile killers and provide insight and advice on cold cases.

What these teens are initially unaware of is an active case that has the FBI chasing their tails. A serial killer is on the loose and targeting teenagers. Lewis has to face her fears as a survivor of a serial killer herself, but to do that, she’ll have to face teenage sociopath Simon Gutmunsson, the man who killed Bell’s father, and learn what he knows about this new killer. Her demons, however, are the greatest allies she has.

Marney has taken the twisted connection between Dr. Hannibal Lecter and Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs and created a teenage version of that relationship, complete with the defiance and angst that teens carry when they are still trying to find their way in the world — serial killer or not.

None Shall Sleep by Ellie Marney is a wild story with FBI analysis, detective work, interviewing of serial killers, and interplay between teens and killers. Marney is deft in her world building and her character development. The pacing is on target, even if I figured out the killer before we got to the final scenes. The narrators are fantastic.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

Ellie Marney is a NYT and internationally bestselling author of crime fiction. Her titles include the Aurealis-winning None Shall Sleep, White Night, the Every series – starting with Every Breath – and the companion novel No Limits, White Night, and the Circus Hearts series, starting with Circus Hearts 1. Her next book, The Killing Code, an intense mystery about female codebreakers hunting a serial killer against a backdrop of 1940s wartime Washington D.C., will be released in September 2022.

Ellie’s books are published in ten countries, and have been optioned for television. She’s spent a lifetime researching in mortuaries, talking to autopsy specialists, and asking former spies about how to make explosives from household items, and now she lives quite sedately in south-eastern Australia with her family.

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Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron

February 10, 2022 by

Source: Publisher
Hardcover, 336 pgs.
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Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron is like Nancy Drew set during the time of Jane Austen’s life. Part of the title is inspired by the historic eruption of Mount Tambora, which caused some series climate effects, including crop failures, and led to the “Year Without a Summer” in 1816. I loved that Barron stayed true to the whereabouts (based on historic record) of Austen and her sister, Cassandra, when they took a trip to Cheltenham Spa in Gloucestershire.

Things in the Austen household are not all roses, but even as uncertainty lays claim to the family’s fortunes and to the reputation of Austen’s brother Charles, Jane and her sister take the time to travel to the waters, hoping to improve Jane’s health. Once there, the ladies encounter some very dull and dark characters who many of the other guests seem to be avoiding. The spas themselves are not at all what either lady expects, and in fact, they begin to wonder if the waters are bad for people’s health.

When a young lady in a basket chair turns up at Mrs. Potter’s where they are staying, Austen and her sister are even more intrigued. A captain, a devoted friend who protects her friend in the chair, and a mysterious theater dialect coach all add to the mystery when a Viscount shows up claiming the woman in the basket chair is his wife! When a pug ends up dead at Mrs. Potter’s and later a murder occurs at the local masquerade, Austen and the smitten Mr. West work together to uncover the truth of the murder.

Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron is a delightful who-done-it mystery whose main protagonist is one of the great observers of human nature, Jane Austen. I loved that Austen used her keen observation skills to unearth the truth of the mysteries within these pages. All of the characters have their own secrets, and there is even a bit of romance for Jane herself. Highly recommend for Jane Austen readers and those who love a good mystery!

RATING: Cinquain

About the Author:

Francine Mathews was born in Binghamton, New York, the last of six girls. She attended Princeton and Stanford Universities, where she studied history, before going on to work as an intelligence analyst at the CIA. She wrote her first book in 1992 and left the Agency a year later. Since then, she has written twenty-five books, including five novels in the Merry Folger series (Death in the Off-Season, Death in Rough Water, Death in a Mood Indigo, Death in a Cold Hard Light, and Death on Nantucket) as well as the nationally bestselling Being a Jane Austen mystery series, which she writes under the pen name, Stephanie Barron. She lives and works in Denver, Colorado. Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Pinterest, and GoodReads.

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, fiction, historical fiction, New Authors Challenge, Publishers/Publicists, random house, Read in 2021, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Red Widow by Alma Katsu (audio)

January 26, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Audible: 10+ hrs.
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Red Widow by Alma Katsu, narrated by Mozhan Marnò, is a thriller but from a female CIA analyst’s point of view. Don’t let the word “analyst” make you think this is all data focused because it isn’t.

Lyndsey Duncan, the so-called human lie detector, is called into CIA headquarters by Eric Newman to investigate the murder of a Russian asset and a potential mole within either U.S.-based CIA or its Russian counterpart agency. She is warned to stay away from the widow, Theresa Warner, who is obviously the mole referenced by Katsu’s book title. For me, the story is not about the hunt for the mole, but about the clandestine agency’s backstabbing, infighting, lack of loyalty, and agents’ expendability. It’s about the high-wire act that agents dangle on every day, attempting to protect our freedoms and stave off attacks and other horrible events.

The narrator of Katsu’s book is fantastic with all of the voices. Each character is well fleshed out and discernible in conversations and interactions. I loved the narrator. I loved that this book showcased female protagonists, but the story was a bit too predictable, which I chock up to reading too many other spy novels and police-based books. It’s hard to surprise me with twists and turns in these kinds of books. One other thing that bothered me, is that Lyndsey is slow to realize she’s a pawn. I felt like she was smarter than that. We all have flaws and blindspots, and perhaps that is what trips up Lyndsey in this novel.

Red Widow by Alma Katsu, narrated by Mozhan Marnò, is a spy thriller I wanted to love, but I just ended up liking. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth reading because it was, and I hope this is a genre that Katsu continues to explore, though I admit I prefer her horror and paranormal books.

RATING: Tercet

Filed Under: audiobooks, fiction, purchased, Read in 2022, reviews Tagged With: , ,

The Last Night in London by Karen White

January 18, 2022 by

Source: the publisher
Hardcover, 480 pgs.
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The Last Night in London by Karen White is an epic WWII novel with dual narratives set in during the Blitz and in 2019. Young, Yorkshire girl Eva Harlow, whose run from her life of poverty where her mother is a laundress and her father is a drunk, meets Precious Dubose, a young Tennessean, by happenstance at the train station and become like sisters as they navigate early 1940s London as models. Meanwhile, Madison Warner in 2019 is tasked with writing an article for British Vogue about Precious Dubose and the fashions in war time. She’s struggling to live life even as she assumes she’ll have a short life.

“Pushing herself against a wall, as if she could hide from the noise and the terror, she closed her eyes. Moonlight Sonata. Someone — she couldn’t remember who, in an underground club perhaps — had whispered that that was what he called the music of the nightly bombings.” (pg. 2)

Eva Harlow is a woman eager to reinvent herself. Her mother has lived her life under the hands of a drunk husband, but when he’s sent to jail, her other moves away from their home and hopes for a new life. This pushes Eva to seek out her own way and become someone more than an uneducated Yorkshire girl. She drops her real name and morphs into an elegant model, learning new languages from fellow models and reading books and newspapers to become more educated. Precious becomes like a sister to her and they work so well together and are often mistaken for one another because they are both slim, blond, and elegant.

Madison Warner travels to London to write an article on Precious, who is now nearly 100 years old, and the man she’s pushed out of her mind will be sharing a flat with her and Precious. Colin is a dreamy Brit who still holds a candle for her, even as she’s pushed him away when she left Oxford.

This book is epic. Karen White has outdone herself with these characters and the story. I was along for the entire ride. I couldn’t put this book down. What happened to Eva and her RAF pilot Graham St. John? Why does Precious have all of Eva’s things? What is she hiding? And what is Alex Grof’s role in this?

As for Madison and Colin, there is the navigation of past hurts, as well as the mystery they are both so eager to solve. Colin’s nana Precious, though not by blood, loves him like her own and vice versa, while Madison is a distant relation, according to a genealogy project. As they unravel the mystery, will they be closer than before? Will Maddie get a grip and take life by the horns and just live life to the fullest? Will Precious help them both move forward?

There is so much beauty in this novel. There are family bonds, friendships that become like family bonds, romance, and intrigue. The Last Night in London by Karen White will capture your imagination and hold you hostage as you whisk yourself around London’s streets during the Blitz and immerse yourself in Precious’ memories of fashion and so much more.

RATING: Cinquain

Filed Under: challenges, fiction, Penguin, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2022, review copy, reviews, WWII Reading Challenge Tagged With: ,

Cabinet of Wrath: A Doll Collection by Tara Campbell

January 12, 2022 by

Source: GBF
Paperback, 98 pgs.
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Cabinet of Wrath: A Doll Collection by Tara Campbell is a short story collection of disturbing and horrifying stories about dolls and other playthings. Each story breathes life into Barbie’s friends, teddy bears with guns, and so many other body-less beings. These nine stories may seem like innocent looks into the lives of our childish playthings, but these toys are not childish and they are far from innocent. Campbell weaves her tales with such precise language, you’re swept up into this horrifying world in which rape and voodoo have serious, life-threatening consequences and the phrase “let them eat cake” emerges from an entirely different context.

From “The Box”: “Miss Holly raises empty palms. ‘At this point motives are immaterial. All we can manage now are the consequences.'” (pg. 4)

The opening story, “The Box,” finds a number of dolls languishing in the darkness not only of the physical place, but the emotional space. They are unsure why they have been removed from their children and why they can no longer be in the playroom, but once the consequences of events that “happened to them” and were “beyond their control” are revealed, the parallels between these dolls and many young women become clear. The uncertainty, the fear, the anxiety, the shaming. It is all here in this short story, and if it makes you uncomfortable, it should. It should also make you rethink your actions and reactions to young women who find themselves similarly situated, especially when things beyond their control occur. Sympathy, rather than judgment, should be given, along with a helping hand.

Campbell’s stories are haunting and unsettling. They will leave readers looking for the flashlight to not only provide themselves with a sense of hope, but to also reveal some harsh truths. Cabinet of Wrath: A Doll Collection by Tara Campbell is a delight in horror and twisted storytelling that shouldn’t be missed.

The last story I read that had dolls in it was hugely disappointing. You can check out my review of The Birthing House.

RATING: Cinquain

About the Author:

With a BA in English, an MA in German, and an MFA in Creative Writing, Tara Campbell has a demonstrated aversion to money and power. Originally from Anchorage, Alaska, she has also lived in Oregon, Ohio, New York, Germany and Austria. She currently lives in Washington, D.C.

She is the recipient of the following awards from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities: the 2016 Larry Neal Writers’ Award in Adult Fiction, the 2016 Mayor’s Arts Award for Outstanding New Artist, and Arts and Humanities Fellowships for 2018 – 2022. She is also a 2017 Kimbilio Fellow and winner of the 2018 Robert Gover Story Prize.

Tara earned her MFA from American University in 2019, and is a fiction editor at Barrelhouse. She teaches fiction with American University, the Writer’s Center, Politics and Prose, and the National Gallery of Art’s Writing Salon. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

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The Bennet Women by Eden Appiah-Kubi

November 24, 2021 by

Source: Publisher
Paperback, 366 pgs.
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The Bennet Women by Eden Appiah-Kubi is such a fun debute novel. While it is marketed as a modern Pride & Prejudice, it really is so much more than that. The women of Bennet House at Longbourn University are like a family – EJ, Jamie, and Tessa. EJ is an ambitious Black engineering student, and Jamie, her best friend, is a transgender woman who’s studying French and theater. Tessa is a Filipina astronomy major with serious guy problems. Bennet House is full of empowerment for these women, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t in need of support. EJ, in particular, is a young woman who had to give up her ballet dreams and has fallen into a career path she’s not exactly sure she wants. She’s a very serious student and a caring RA for other women in Bennet House, but she needs to let loose and find herself.

“It was a truth universally acknowledged that a black girl at a mostly white college, in an even whiter college town, must befriend someone who can do her hair.” (pg. 19)

When her friend Jamie falls for campus heartthrob and all-around good guy Lee Gregory, EJ finds herself thrown in the company of his arrogant friend, Will. Jamie is balancing her new identity with her rocky relationship with her mother since her transition and EJ is the one friend who has stood by her. Jamie has issues navigating her new life because there’s a lot of uncertainty in her relationships, but she finds that her core support is her friends at Bennet House.

EJ’s relationship with Will starts off with a bang of an insult and a horrible follow-up encounter at her favorite diner. These two seem to be like oil and water. But things take a turn they don’t expect.

This novel does not shy away from the obstacles faced by blacks in America, nor the struggles of LGBTQ people. I also loved that the author based her writing in places she clearly knows well. As a local D.C. area writer, it was great to see the city and its suburbs portrayed in a way that isn’t focused only on gun violence. EJ’s family is stable and supportive, her sister’s ambitions are realized but she never forgets where she came from, and I loved the talk EJ’s father gives Will.

Appiah-Kubi is a delightful writer who has a firm grasp of what makes any situation humorous. I loved that she took an Austen classic and made it her own. EJ is a strong character and so are her friends, and they face similar trouble that all college students do. How to find their place on campus, how to navigate their courses to plan their future careers, and even how to balance it all with jobs and love.

The Bennet Women by Eden Appiah-Kubi should be on your holiday shopping list this year for the readers in your life who need a little hope, a little light, and some romance. This book was a read I couldn’t put down, and as many of you know, these last two years I’ve struggled with picking up fiction books and finishing them. I had no problem reading this book in just a few days.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

Eden Appiah-Kubi fell in love with classic novels in fourth grade, when her mom read her Jane Eyre, chapter-by-chapter, as a bedtime story. She’s an alumna of a small New England university with a weird mascot (Go Jumbos!), and a former Peace Corps volunteer. Eden developed her fiction writing through years in a small Washington, DC critique group. Today she works as a Librarian and lives in the DC suburbs with her husband and hilarious daughter.

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, fiction, New Authors Challenge, Read in 2021, reviews Tagged With: , ,

The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen (audio)

November 11, 2021 by

Source: Purchased
Audible, 12+ hours
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It is Veteran’s day in the United States, and to that we must not forget to remember that many of our veteran’s face psychological struggles in addition to any physical damages they may have sustained. In addition to honoring their service, we should consider honoring them with greater assistance and compassion.

The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen, narrated by Francois Chau, really made me want to lock away all of these people. They are all broken, pessimistic, and full of debauchery. Does that mean they need to be locked away? Not necessarily, but I certainly would not want to spend any time with them.

Nguyen picks up this story from where he left off in The Sympathizer, so I would recommend you read these in order. The narrator and his blood brother Bon arrive in France in the early 1980s, but the journey in the boat is the most compelling part of this novel.

***May Be Spoilers Below***

Our narrator is still of more than one mind about things, and he pulls from philosophies and French culture while in France. Perhaps it is the influence of living in France with his fake aunt. There is still the tug between colonialism/capitalism and communism and a bifurcated identity that keeps our narrator drifting further into trouble as a drug-dealer.

I found this den of inequity unsettling, as you should, and even the narrator is left wiggling in his seat on more than one occasion. However, I felt that too much of the narration focused on nudity, body, sex, etc., rather than on the spy’s struggle to overcome his bi-racial identity and his re-education in the communist camps or the capitalist world he finds himself in. The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen, narrated by Francois Chau, is about his character’s inability to be committed and the existential crisis of his own making.

RATING: Tercet

About the Author:

Viet Thanh Nguyen’s novel The Sympathizer is a New York Times best seller and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Other honors include the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, the Edgar Award for Best First Novel from the Mystery Writers of America, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction from the American Library Association, the First Novel Prize from the Center for Fiction, a Gold Medal in First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and the Asian/Pacific American Literature Award from the Asian/Pacific American Librarian Association. His other books are Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War (a finalist for the National Book Award in nonfiction) and Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America. He is the Aerol Arnold Chair of English and Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. His next book is a short story collection, The Refugees, forthcoming in February 2017 from Grove Press.

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A Mother’s Tale and Other Stories by Khanh Ha (giveaway)

November 10, 2021 by

Source: the author and Premier Virtual Author Book Tours
Paperback, 150 pgs.
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A Mother’s Tale and Other Stories by Khanh Ha is a collection of stories that explore heartbreak, loss, and healing. Readers of Ha’s work will see some familiar faces, especially Mrs. Rossi, Nicola, Le, and others. These stories weave in and out of the jungles of Vietnam and elsewhere to untangle the unseen connections we have to one another. Some of these connections will not bring the best turn to some lives, while others will highlight the truth of people who are enigmas to us.

“She wondered where all the souls of the dead have gone. I told her perhaps the ghosts needed a medium to show themselves to the living, and the fireflies’ blue lights were that medium, just like earth, water, fire, and air made up the medium of living human beings.” (from “A Mother’s Tale”)

The ghosts of the dead and lost souls are never too far from these stories. They are hovering at the edge as the living try to sort out their lives and come to terms with the past. Some of the stories in this collection shed a great deal of backstory and light onto the story in Mrs. Rossi’s Dream, but I don’t think you need to have read that novel to enjoy these stories, though the stories did elevate my understanding of his multilayered characters in that novel. I particularly loved the insight into Mrs. Rossi’s adopted daughter, Chi Lan. In many ways, I would consider this collection a companion to the novel.

A Mother’s Tale and Other Stories by Khanh Ha offers an array of character studies that explore broken relationships, loss, the effects of war even generations later, but more than that, his work paints a picture of humanity that is at times beautiful as it is dark and traumatic. Once I started delving into this world, it was hard to come out of it without being changed. It was hard to look at life and not see the connections that propel us on our journeys.

About the Author:

Khanh Ha is the author of Flesh, The Demon Who Peddled Longing, and Mrs. Rossi’s Dream. He is a seven-time Pushcart nominee, finalist for the Mary McCarthy Prize, Many Voices Project, Prairie Schooner Book Prize, and The University of New Orleans Press Lab Prize. He is the recipient of the Sand Hills Prize for Best Fiction, the Robert Watson Literary Prize in Fiction, and the Orison Anthology Award for Fiction. Mrs. Rossi’s Dream, was named Best New Book by Booklist and a 2019 Foreword Reviews INDIES Silver Winner and Bronze Winner.  A Mother’s Tale & Other Stories has already won the C&R Press Fiction Prize. Visit him on Facebook and Twitter.

RATING: Quatrain

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The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen (audio)

September 22, 2021 by

Source: Purchased
Audible, 5+ hrs.
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The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen, narrated by the author, is a collection of short stories, with some seeming to be autobiographical or at least inspired by his own life here in the United States. Some of these refugees are seen through the eyes of another, and in this way, Nguyen provides us with a dual perspective — how the narrator views the refugee and how the refugees view themselves.

The narration was satisfactory as read by the author, but some of it could have been better served by a more practiced audiobook narrator who could have breathed life into the characters and helped readers “feel” the tensions a little more deeply. The author’s narration really didn’t add anything to these stories, like a trained narrator would have.

Despite the narration falling flat, these stories explore what it means to leave one’s homeland for another and be caught between them — between what happened in that other country and what is happening now as a result of those experiences. But not only has Nguyen given us stories that explore that rift in identity and culture shock of entering a new country to call home, he also explores the family bond and how it can be frayed by the past in Vietnam, dementia, sibling jealousy, and so much more. What are the dreams of these refugees and immigrants, will they be achieved, have the given up, are they settling, can they feel at home in a new country that is so different from where they came from? These are the kinds of questions explored in theses stories, and many of these characters seem to stem from Nguyen’s own experiences and family history.

The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen is probably best read in print or in ebook, rather than on audio, so the nuance of Nguyen’s stories are not lost on the reader. I did enjoy spending time with these characters, but I’ll likely revisit them in print.

RATING: Tercet

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Billy Summers by Stephen King (audio)

September 16, 2021 by

Source: Purchased
Audible, 16+ hrs.
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***trigger warning for sexual violence***

Billy Summers by Stephen King, narrated by Paul Sparks, is beyond the supernatural, horror that this author is known for, but it brings to life new horrors — those of real life. Billy, a former soldier, is a murderer for hire, and he’s looking for one last job so he can begin a new life. The set up for an assassination job is detailed and slow going, but readers will delight in the character building of Billy’s alter egos — the plants in various towns to hide what he is really doing. Masquerading as a writer in an office building, a computer IT guy, and his own Billy Summers’ shtick, which isn’t really how he acts.

In many ways, the face of Summers is similar to King’s characters created in years past — Billy is almost a stand-in for King, one of the ultimate character creators. King does give a nod to his previous writings here later on in the novel with a sneak peak atop a ridge at The Overlook. It is almost like this novel is an homage to all the risks he’s taken in his career and a middle-finger to the industry that counted him out and pigeonholed him. But I could be over-analyzing here.

Paul Sparks does an excellent job with every face of Billy Summers, and the narration is back and forth into Summers’ past in Falluja when he was a sniper. What I’ve always loved about King’s novels is his attention to detail, his ability to create well-rounded characters, and the settings that mirror real, small town life that is often considered pale in comparison to large, city life (a perception that he blows out of the water every time).

The most troubling aspect of the novel, however, is the obligatory rape of a young woman who becomes an acquiescent victim with Stockholm syndrome.  But even here, King is stretching this trope as he builds the sad relationship between her and Billy Summers into a morally ambiguous argument that not all snipers are bad guys. Perhaps, there are some who do draw a line in the sand, and Billy does rationalize his actions.

Even as I say that Billy is a mirror for King, so is the young woman by the final pages. It almost made me wonder if King may be done writing, but then there’s something more to this young lady that makes me confident that King is not done with his fictional worlds quite yet.

Billy Summers by Stephen King, narrated by Paul Sparks, is a multilayered story about a stone-cold, calculating assassin for hire who continually wrestles with his morality. King takes you on a journey that will leave you wondering about your own morality and mortality. Things in real life can run astray at any moment, even in a small town.

RATING: Cinquain

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