What Fiction are you reading this week, July 7, 2024?

[hermetic]

Milwaukee Children's Library

Don't be ashamed about reading children's books. Adult books are about sad people having affairs while kid's books have a magic tree house or a worm driving an apple.

So, I'm reading The Thief of Always by Clive Barker. I've never read any of his stories but was looking for something to distract me from the horror that is going on in this country right now. This was a good choice. Sure, it's a kid's book but that just means it's easy to read and Barker's illustrations are quite entertaining. And a bit creepy.

Listening to Storm Watch by C. J. Box. Wyoming Game Warden Joe Pickett investigates a mysterious death at a secret remote high-tech facility in this riveting new novel. Very timely, we've got crypto mining and local militant activists (speaking of current horrors, Box really nails it). I like reading about snow storms when the weather is scorching outside. It sure will be this week.

What will you be reading about this week?
Stay cool, my friends.

[yellowdogintexas]

1. I finished "Sins of the Father" - a Kat Parker mystery. by K L Phelps

Sixth in this series.

Kat Parker was looking forward to a nice normal night out with her boyfriend—though nothing is truly normal when you can see and talk with the dead. However, when Damian arrives with news that his estranged father has been killed, date night quickly turns into a trip to Vegas, the supernatural capital of the world. Whoever said romance was dead?

As a former detective for the Vegas Police Department, Damian is well aware of his father’s shady business dealings, but he’s still surprised when he’s confronted by an unstable squid-faced creature demanding he deliver on his father’s final deal.

With time running short and the creature’s patience running even shorter, Kat must help to figure out who killed Damian’s father and how to deliver on his final debt. Otherwise, Kat may have more to worry about than playing middleman to a postmortem family reconciliation or figuring out if her pet turtle has a gambling problem.

I love Supernatural Las Vegas! Of course the squid faced creature is a Chuthlu and there is a whole tribe of them.

[yellowdogintexas]

2. Now I am reading: "Jesus and John Wayne": How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation

It is dry but informative.
Jesus and John Wayne is a sweeping, revisionist history of the last seventy-five years of white evangelicalism, revealing how evangelicals have worked to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with an idol of rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism—or in the words of one modern chaplain, with “a spiritual badass.” ..... (snip)

Challenging the commonly held assumption that the “moral majority” backed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 for purely pragmatic reasons, Du Mez reveals that Trump in fact represented the fulfillment, rather than the betrayal, of white evangelicals’ most deeply held values: patriarchy, authoritarian rule, aggressive foreign policy, fear of Islam, ambivalence toward #MeToo, and opposition to Black Lives Matter and the LGBTQ community. A much-needed reexamination of perhaps the most influential subculture in this country, Jesus and John Wayne shows that, far from adhering to biblical principles, modern white evangelicals have remade their faith, with enduring consequences for all Americans.

This stuff really goes further back than most people think.

[hermetic]

6. Wow, interesting.

And scary.

[hermetic]

4. Cool

The Barker book has fish people and vampires. Lots of talking to the dead. It can be fun.

[cbabe]

3. Re-reading the re-reads. Library down going on

two months due to ransomware attack.

I’m not the only one scouring little little libraries and used book stores.

Going to have a loooong list when library re-opens. Thanks to all of you.

Speaking of snow stories on broiling hot days: A Better Man/ Louise Penny.

[hermetic]

5. Still down? Bummer.

Oh yeah, always lots of good snow to be found in Three Pines, my favorite town in fiction world.

[mentalsolstice]

7. Nothing wrong with reading a children's book during difficult times!

I’m reading The Sweet Blue Distance by Sara Donati. It’s an epic tale about a nurse/midwife traveling from NY to Santa Fe for work in 1857. On my Kindle app it’s 777 pages long, but oh so good!

Stay cool everyone.

[hermetic]

9. Yikes, 800 pages in hardcover

Just newly released and everyone seems to really like it. I can tell you that Santa Fe is easy to fall in love with. Beautiful area. Thanks for telling us about this delightful sounding novel!

[japple]

8. Thank you for the weekly thread, hermetic. It's a good time to stay inside and read in my

steaming hot corner of N. GA! I found a great book on an old wish list: Properties of Thirst by Marianne Wiggins. I'm about 1/3 in and it's very good so far.

Rockwell “Rocky” Rhodes has spent years fiercely protecting his California ranch from the LA Water Corporation. It is here where he and his beloved wife Lou raised their twins, Sunny and Stryker, and it is here where Rocky has mourned Lou in the years since her death.

As Sunny and Stryker reach the cusp of adulthood, the country teeters on the brink of war. Stryker decides to join the fight, deploying to Pearl Harbor not long before the bombs strike. Soon, Rocky and his family find themselves facing yet another incomprehensible tragedy.

Rocky is determined to protect his remaining family and the land where they’ve loved and lost so much. But when the government decides to build a Japanese-American internment camp next to the ranch, Rocky realizes that the land faces even bigger threats than the LA watermen he’s battled for years. Complicating matters is the fact that the idealistic Department of the Interior man assigned to build the camp, who only begins to understand the horror of his task after it may be too late, becomes infatuated with Sunny and entangled with the Rhodes family.

Happy reading everyone!

[hermetic]

10. That sounds quite good, too

Also fairly new. "a novel destined to be an American classic: a sweeping masterwork."

We used to have a Rocky Rhodes here. Remember?

[txwhitedove]

11. Reading very real factual fictional scenario of nuclear war, written by Annie Jacobsen, who is a

Pulitzer Prize finalist. Nuclear War: a Scenario, explores a "tick-tock scenario" of a "nuclear missle inbound toward the United States." Very good, worth reading, but I have the next Chet and Bernie mystery ready to pick up at the Library tomorrow.

Love that picture of the children's library. Storm Beryl headed this way so it's a rainy day good for reading.

[hermetic]

12. Hope you stay safe

Rain sounds nice, though. I'm watering all my trees today while it's 90 because it's going to be over 100 every day next week. Yep, lots of reading ahead.

Your book sounds terrifying.

[rsdsharp]

13. I read The Bridges at Toki-Ri. I'm embarrassed to say that I previously had no idea that James Michener wrote it.

The movie, which I’ve also seen and enjoyed, tracked the book closely.

That said, I’m not a fan of Michener in general. Bridges, is only 85 pages, and doesn’t read like the other works I’ve tried. This book also had an excerpt from Hawaii, which I could not get through. The inch by inch building of an island over 40 million years is just too much — and too little — for me.

I’m currently reading The Confessor by Daniel Silva, the third Gabriel Allon novel.

[yellowdogintexas]

21. Portrait of an Unknown Woman (Daniel Silva #22) for $1.99 today on Amazon (Kindle version)

It popped up in BookBub. I felt quite lucky to find it. Every so often books like thata show up for $1.99
I love those books!!!

[rsdsharp]

23. Thanks! I just bought it.

[yellowdogintexas]

25. I love those books. This may be the 3rd or 4th one I have picked up for $1.99

I have several of the earlier ones in Paperback. One of my very favorite authors, and characters!!!

[rsdsharp]

28. I really like Silva, but I struggled a bit with this one.

It’s like names were coming out of a firehose. Many of them, including the minor character's, and the artists, also had pseudo names. I kept wondering, “Who is this person, again?” Still, worth the effort.

[Jilly_in_VA]

14. I just finished

Where We Belong, by Catherine Ryan Hyde. It's the story of a teenager with an autistic, nonverbal younger sister and a mother who seems to expect her to solve all the family's problems. Salvation (of sorts) comes along in the form of a prickly bachelor neighbor with a Great Dane, but it takes quite some time. It was an amazing book, as hers tend to be.

Just started Left, by Tamar Osstrowski. This one concerns a mother with two daughters, one of whom is autistic. I haven't gotten very far, but she has just taken off and left the autistic one, who is verbal, with a friend. Each chapter seems to be told from a different POV--each sister speaks her own, and the mother's, at least thus far, is in the third person.

[Number9Dream]

15. Half-way through "The Fall of the Templars" by Robyn Young

Thanks for the thread, hermetic.

I've decided to return this historical fiction to the library unfinished. It might have been better if I'd read the first two books, but I doubt it. There is too much boring political intrigue, and not enough action. In addition, the author leaves chapters with unanswered questions, and then jumps a year or two in the story. I gave it a shot.

[hermetic]

19. That's a shame

I think we've got enough political intrigue in real life right now.

Better luck with your next choice.

[Lulu KC]

16. Old Filth

By Jane Gardham

Not the feel good book of my year, but so well done and thoughtful. Pretty amazing, once I settled into it.

[GigiLeigh]

17. I read this thread every week

But never post because I'm not very good at book summaries. I thought I would post this time because this book series is really calming to me. Thought others might feel the same.

A Life for a Life by Lynda McDaniel.

It's about a DC crime reporter who is sick of all the violence so she packs it in and moves to Laurel Falls NC. She meets a remarkable kid and they change each others lives.

But just as she gets used to her new life a murder occurs and it is up to her and her new sidekick to solve it.

For me the mystery of the book takes second stage to the characters who are really well thought out. This book really took me away from all the crap going on.

I'm not great at summing up or reviewing a book but maybe you could see what the reviews say at other sites.

Anyway it is for free right now on Amazon. Definitely worth the price.

[hermetic]

18. Welcome to the group

You did just fine. You can always say as much or little as you want. Title and author are important, of course, so the book can be looked up if someone is interested.

It sounds like a really good story and most reviews are positive. There are a few negatives but that's normal and they are few and far between.

I will add that this book is the first in the Appalachian Mountain Mysteries series, of which there are 7 now. It's a little hard to research since not all of them seem to be in print yet. They are all ebooks. Nothing wrong with that. Just means you're not likely to find them at your library. For now.

Do check in again. We're happy to have you here.

[yellowdogintexas]

22. Welcome!! I cheat and copy from the jacket description on Amazon.

with comments on whether I liked it our not.

[Number9Dream]

20. Welcome to the group and to DU

Ditto to what hermetic wrote to you.

[GigiLeigh]

24. Thanks

I appreciate the warm welcome.

[Pacifist Patriot]

26. The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods

[birdographer]

27. One Step Ahead

Just finished One Step Ahead by Peggy Sherman. Recently showed up on Amazon, free on Kindle Unlimited. Hard to give a synopsis without giving away spoilers... Starts with a murder, moves on to blackmail and the FBI after the main character. A page-turner just to find out what is going to happen with her. A satisfying ending. Not terribly long, 260 pages or thereabouts.