Review: "The Bookbinder's Secret," A.D. Bell

By Paul Carrier

It’s the dawn of the 20th century and Lillian Delaney a young, unmarried woman, lives with her father, an aging and indebted bookseller, in Oxford, England. Lillian (aka Lily) is a proficient apprentice in the arcane business of bookbinding. She’s well-respected by her employer, John Caxton, but she’s leading a humdrum life with little social interaction.

That begins to change when she makes a professional visit to the home of a book-collecting doctor, W. Ashburn, who has received a partially burned book from a London seller, even though he never ordered it.

How and why the book, supposedly a novel from 1851 entitled A Song for a Knave, was damaged is a mystery to both the seller and the recipient. Ashburn has no use for the book and willingly gives it to Lily, who hopes to salvage it.

Only later does Lily discover a scrap of paper tucked into the book’s binding that reads “I wish you had not killed him.” Later still, Lily acquires additional volumes with more hidden pages written in the same style. They are letters, or fragments of letters, from a well-to-do woman to her lover, a penniless British gentleman whom she eventually  marries in a clandestine wedding.

In one passage, the woman writes that her father is furious when he learns that she is pregnant. He verbally assaults her for ruining his chances of marrying her off to a wealthy nobleman. Was his degrading language and horrific tantrum prelude to something more sinister?

Markings in the books hint that there are six of them in all, but Lily only has three. From one of the concealed letters, Lily identifies the woman’s husband as a man named William Heathfield, but questions bloom like weeds as Lily’s obsession grows. Who wrote the letters? Did the woman’s enraged father physically attack her? And who murdered whom?

Lily’s search for answers is made all the more difficult because a knife-wielding thug working for someone else forces her to give him the books she has acquired (after she removed the hidden letters). He then demands that she find and relinquish the remaining books in the set, even though Lily has no idea where they are. Who does this guy work for? And why does his employer have such a keen interest in the books? 

Compounding Lily’s problems, her personal life is a jumbled mess. Her ailing father, who is heavily in debt, is on the verge of selling his bookstore, which is located in the home he shares with Lily. She desperately hopes to prevent the sale by somehow finding enough money to placate her father’s creditors. At the same time, she’s trying to decide how to handle two would-be suitors: a man who works for a bookseller in London and a fellow from Oxford, whom she has known since childhood.

The plot twists in The Bookbinder’s Secret are too numerous to list here, and the author springs them on the reader at a dizzying clip. When someone breaks into Lily's home and assaults her father, sending him to the hospital, Lily becomes all the more determined to find the rest of the books.

It takes a while to tie up the loose ends, but all becomes clear in good time. The Bookbinder’s Secret is a novel for readers who enjoy a lively, clever yarn. It’s a complex tale suggesting that, while books often reveal marvels to those who read them, sometimes secrets remain just that -- secrets -- until a determined protagonist who is skilled at assembling books begins t0 dissect them. Very carefully, of course.

Review: "Northwest Angle," William Kent Krueger

 By Paul Carrier

Northwest Angle, the 11th novel in William Kent Krueger’s long-running mystery series (22 books and counting) starts off pleasantly enough, with Cork O’Connor and his family vacationing aboard a rented houseboat on a remote lake that straddles the U.S.-Canadian border.

But the getaway is about to take an ominous turn.

For one thing,  an oddly named meteorological disaster know as a derecho is in the offing. What’s a derecho, you ask? Here’s Merriam-Webster’s definition: “a large fast-moving complex of thunderstorms with powerful straight-line winds that cause widespread destruction.”

Of course, Cork, his three children (two adult daughters and younger son), and his sister-in-law and her husband have no idea what a derecho is, or that one is about to bear down on them. But once the storm blows through, many islands in the lake are wastelands and the lake itself is dotted with tree limbs and other debris,.

Cork’s oldest daughter Jenny finds herself stranded on an island. Initially, her siblings and their father are unaccounted for. That leaves sister-in-law Rose and her husband Mal alone on the houseboat, searching for family members as best they can. Cork’s daughter Anne and son Stephen eventually reunite with Rose and Mal. And Cork does find his way to Jenny’s island, but not before Jenny discovers both a horrendous crime and a tiny miracle.

Jenny finds a cabin on the island containing the body of a young woman who has been tortured and murdered. Nearby, she also finds an infant, hungry and dehydrated but still very much alive. Fortunately, there are clean diapers, baby formula and a Coleman stove in the cabin.

Why was the woman murdered and her child abandoned? Will the killer or killers return while Cork and Jenny are still on the scene? If that happens, how will Cork defend himself, his daughter and the infant? As a former county sheriff, Cork is intimately familiar with guns, but he happens to be unarmed.

Cork, Jenny and the infant move to a makeshift shelter elsewhere on the island (and, later still, to another island nearby). But when Cork returns to the cabin to further investigate it he discovers that the murder victim’s body has disappeared.

Is the removal of the corpse connected to a mysterious speedboat that the O’Connors spotted surveying the area with a searchtlight? In short order, two things become clear. The guy in that boat is somehow connected to the dead woman. And whatever he’s up to, he’s not on a rescue mission to save people stranded by the storm.

Cork, Jenny and the baby eventually join the rest of the O’Connor clan, and a murder investigation is launched. The early stages of that probe reveal that the victim was a young Ojibwe woman named Lily Smalldog. Her half brother, Noah Smalldog, is suspected of having killed Lily, but he’s proving to be elusive.

Subsequent events suggest that the murderer was intent on kidnapping Lily’s son for reasons unknown, and remains determined to do so even if that triggers more deaths. When another man who knew Lily disappears from his blood-splattered home, it begins to look like Lily’s killer may have found a second victim.

Krueger’s pacing is brisk and his plot is well-crafted. There’s no shortage of nail-biting scenes in Northwest Angle, including decidedly unpleasant encounters with a group of stone-faced religious fanatics who may have ties to Noah Smalldog. The plot takes such a surprising turn in the final chapters that I was astounded, which, I suspect, will by the reaction of other readers as well. An already gripping narrative quickly becomes highly charged.

Over the course of the novel, Krueger balances drama with more restrained touches, such as the increasing maturity of young Stephen O’Connor, the tense relationship between Jenny and her boyfriend, and Cork’s ongoing struggle to cope with the murder of his wife Jo, which occurred in a previous novel. Having found and cared for the newfound infant after his mother was murdered, Jenny becomes extremely attached to the child, amid signs that she hopes to adopt him.

Part of the appeal of the first 11 O’Connor novels, which usually are set in or near Minnesota, where Cork lives, stems from Krueger’s frequent, nuanced references to the region’s Indigenous people. Cork has some Ojibwe (aka, Chippewa) ancestry and his son, in particular, shares Cork’s interest in tribal culture, traditions and language. That adds an intriguing element to the series, including this entry.

Review: "The Body in the Bath," Ragnar Jónasson

By Liz Soares

Reykjavik police officer Helgi is in trouble. Bergbóra, his former girlfriend, is dead—and Helgi is accused of murdering her.

This is Helgi’s third appearance, following Death at the Sanatorium and The Mysterious Case of the Missing Crime Writer. He is a low-key guy who’s obsessed with classic murder mysteries. Given his passive nature, it’s not surprising he put up with Bergbóra’s alcoholic, violent rages. Or that he never told anyone except his psychotherapist about how she abused him. Or that he even kept paying the rent on the apartment they once shared even after he left her.

Helgi finally put his foot down when Bergbóra ran over his new girlfriend, Anita. Of course, the fact that Bergbóra murdered Anita makes Helgi a prime suspect in her death.

Before Helgi is taken into custody, he was continuing to investigate the disappearance of his predecessor, Hulda. (She is the main character in Jónasson’s “Hidden Iceland” series.) Bergbóra was found dead in her bathtub. By strange coincidence, Helgi was examining one of Hulda’s cases that also involved a corpse in a tub.

But he is interrupted in his work by two of his colleagues. Alexander seems convinced Helgi did it, but the younger Mani is keeping an open mind. After all, Bergbóra was a beast. Surely she had destroyed other lives along the way.

Jónasson is the master of the slow boil. He builds suspense with spare prose. Helgi’s plight is agonizing. He has a decent lawyer, but is that enough? He doesn’t always stand up for himself as he should, but the pressure is wearing on him. Will he break?

When the final revelation of the murderer’s identity is made, it is shocking, heartbreaking, and yet totally believable.

This is a gripping addition to a fine series.

------------ 

The Body in the Bathwill be released on November 10, 2026. I read an advanced reader’s copy through NetGalley.

Review: "The Correspondent," Virginia Evans

By Liz Soares

Sybil, a retired lawyer, is 72. She has been writing letters all her life. In The Correspondent, we follow Sybil’s “third act” through her correspondence.

It’s quite a show.

Sybil’s story is amusing, sad, sometimes infuriating—but always compelling. The Correspondent is one of the best books I’ve ever read.

Sybil is crusty, funny and has a “take no prisoners” attitude. She is ready to do battle on behalf of just about any perceived injustice to herself or the people she (apparently) cares about.

She has exchanged letters with Rosalie, her friend and sister-in-law, since they were teens. They always end their letters with a note on what they are reading. But when Sybil perceives Rosalie has overstepped a boundary, their relationship is endangered.

Sybil’s ex-husband, Lars, is dying of cancer in Belgium. Can she bring herself to write back to him?

When the new head of the English department at the University of Maryland doesn’t want to let Sybil audit classes, as she’s done for years, Sybil tries to deal with the situation through letters, but finally has to face the woman in person.

Her interactions with her neighbor, Mr. Lubec, involve notes, but are also recounted in letters to others. Mr. Lubec is attracted to Sybil, even after she accidentally runs over his cat. 

This tragic mistake happens because Sybil has macular degeneration, a devastating diagnosis for a reader and writer. Her condition runs as a thread throughout the novel.

Meanwhile, a lawyer from Houston whom she meets at a funeral wants to date her and won’t take no for an answer. She exchanges letters with the quirky, troubled teenage son of a former colleague and helps him when he reaches a crisis point.

Sybil has a secret, deep and dark. She tries to deal with it through letters. But her fraught relationship with her daughter Fiona is related to this past trauma, and that too must be dealt with in person.

Sybil is adopted, and has a warm relationship with her brother (also adopted), who lives in Paris. Yes, they exchange letters. Then Sybil has the opportunity to connect with her birth family. Should she? Her decision could change her life.

Through it all, she writes letters to authors—and Joan Didion writes back. More than once!

Sybil can be an exasperating character, and her relationship with Fiona is truly awful, but I found it impossible not to like her and feel compassion for her. Sybil is stubborn and usually doesn’t see the big picture, but that’s not the sum of her character.  I was in tears as I reached the final pages.

And that’s all you really need to know about this wonderful book.

Review: "How to Read a Book," Monica Wood

By Liz Soares

Harriet, a retired teacher, facilitates a book group at the Maine women’s prison. 

Violet is a member. She drove under the influence and killed a woman: Lorraine Daigle, a kindergarten teacher.

Frank Daigle is Lorraine’s husband, a retired machinist. He had a complicated relationship with Lorraine and is at loose ends after her death.

The three meet up in a fateful moment at a Portland book store. Violet, released early, is drawn to a cat, up for adoption, that she sees in the window.

Harriet is looking for the next selection for the book group.

Frank is working part-time doing maintenance in the shop. He spots Harriet, speaks to her, and feels a wave of attraction. Then he spies Violet.

Worlds collide.

This heartfelt, gently humorous novel left me teary-eyed. Then I proclaimed it an instant favorite.

Before all hell breaks loose when Violet comes into Frank’s view, he has suggested to Harriet that she try poetry next. She reacts warmly to him, but when he freaks out (in his way; he’s a gentle, kind man) at seeing the woman responsible for his wife’s death, she hardens to him.

Frank, however, wants to forgive Violet, and she is ready to begin a new chapter, to lead a good life. Eventually, the three unite.

Harriet helps Violet get a job in a bird lab at the university. The young woman loves working with the verbal, intelligent African gray parrots. She also grows too close to the lab’s director, Mishka, a brilliant but sullen Russian. 

Harriet continues to lead the book group. The women affectionately call her “Bookie.” When they read Spoon River Anthology, their imaginations are fired up and they start writing. Harriet is fulfilled by her work, but her niece and daughters are concerned that Harriet is too familiar with the inmates. They even know where her cat, Tabsy, hangs out in her home.

Frank has to deal with a drama-queen daughter, who idolized her mother. Should he, can he, tell her the truth about Lorraine?

These issues all come to a head for the characters, individually and together, in dramatic fashion. And the Spoon River Anthology fits in wonderfully with the poignant ending of the book.

I thoroughly enjoyed the descriptions of the bird lab, and Violet’s interactions with the parrots. I may have even learned a thing or two about animal behavior. Of course, as a retired librarian, I found the book group interactions and Harriet’s process for selecting materials engrossing. And Frank’s love of working with metal and fashioning it into useful objects was fascinating. 

How to Read a Book is the community read selection for Lithgow Public Library this year. I’m looking forward to participating in a book discussion on it and then a reception for and program by Monica Wood later this month.

Review: "The King at the Edge of the World," Arthur Phillips

By Paul Carrier

As this spellbinding novel opens, Mahmoud Ezzedine seems to have it all. A well-respected doctor in Constantinople, he serves as the personal physician to the sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Ezzedine has a lovely home in a charming setting, a wife he adores and a young son whom he loves dearly.

But devastating complications loom. When the sultan’s top advisers dispatch a diplomatic mission to England in 1591, Ezzedine, who has no desire to leave Constantinople, is sent along to care for the ambassador and his retinue during their travels.

Unbeknownst to Ezzedine, the ambassador’s deputy, Cafir bin Ibrahim, hopes to marry the good doctor’s wife, Saruka. How to get Ezzedine out of the way? As the English visit winds down and the Turks prepare to return home, Ibrahim concocts a scheme to leave Ezzedine behind in London, as a gift of sorts from the sultan to Queen Elizabeth.

Ezzedine is heartbroken, but powerless to resist. In time, out of necessity, he converts to Christianity and changes his name to Matthew Thatcher. The queen eventually “gifts” him to a sickly baron whom she sends home to the north of England, where Ezzedine remains until he gets drawn into an investigation of Elizabeth’s likely successor.

By the early 1600s, Elizabeth, old and childless, is unwell and near death. The presumed heir to her Protestant realm is King James VI of Scotland, but there may be complications because of the longstanding struggle between Protestants and Catholics for religious dominance in England.

James was raised as a Protestant, which should appease the powers that be in England. But he is the son of Catholic parents and his wife is a Catholic. His mother was Mary, Queen of Scots, who was executed in 1588 for her involvement in a plot to assassinate Queen Elizabeth.

How, then, can England’s political luminaries learn the Scottish king’s true religious beliefs? As a Protestant, James would be an acceptable successor to Elizabeth. As a Catholic, his coronation would ignite yet another religious bloodbath.

Geoffrey Belloc, a Protestant undercover operative for Elizabeth's government, has a plan. Or, at least, the outline of one. With the blessing of Robert Cecil, Elizabeth’s secretary of state and the power behind the throne, Belloc heads north to persuade the renamed Ezzedine to insinuate himself into the Scottish king’s confidence and nail down his religious allegiance.

Will the humble but sophisticated Ezzedine succeed in his mission? What if the Scottish king snubs him, or is vague and elusive about his views on religion? If Ezzedine succeeds, will Belloc fulfill his promise to return the kindly, misunderstood doctor to Constantinople?

Part of the appeal of this elegant, fast-paced novel springs from the diametrically opposed cultural and religious views of the Turks and the English. Just as the English see Turks as inferiors and heathen practitioners of a bogus religion, Ezzedine views the English — Protestants and Catholics alike — as foolish, brutal zealots who do not recognize the one true God. Scotland, he later decides, is a desolate wasteland with few, if any, saving graces.

Ezzedine is presumed by some in Britain to be a malevolent wizard rather than the skilled physician that he is. For his part, Ezzedine disdains Britain as a foggy, filthy backwater full of drunks, liars and imbeciles, where dueling Christians slaughter one another because they cannot agree on how to interpret their shared religious book.

The truth can be elusive in The King at the Edge of the World, but readers will enjoy the search. In fact, there's a shocking revelation near the end of the novel that sheds a whole new light on a key plot twist. In the process, this startling disclosure redefines our understanding of Mahmoud Ezzedine. No spoilers, but let's just say there's more to this fellow than meets the eye.

Review: "The Botanist's Assistant," Peggy Townsend

By Liz Soares

Margaret Finch is well aware people call her “Big Bird” behind her back.

She doesn’t care.

Margaret knows she’s big-boned and plain-featured, but she has more important matters to focus on. She loves her job at a botany lab at Blackstone College, which appears to be in northern California, and reveres her boss, Dr. Jonathan Deaver.

And now he’s dead. The police think Dr. Deaver expired in his office because of a congenital heart condition. But Margaret, who pays great attention to detail, is suspicious.

She thinks Dr. Deaver was poisoned—by a plant. 

And she’s determined to find out who murdered him.

Margaret finds an unlikely ally in Joe, a custodian with a complex backstory. Although Margaret is socially awkward (and probably on the spectrum), her compassion helps young lab assistant Calvin to turn his life around (sort of) and he gets involved as well. Margaret even wins over a former adversary, Beth, the glamorous assistant to the dean of biological sciences.

It is unsettling for Margaret to discover that Dr. Deaver was not the paragon of virtue she imagined him to be. But she still wants justice done. Could the doctor’s wife, who may have contributed more to his success than he acknowledged, have killed him? And how about his temporary replacement, an unpleasant, ambitious man who has none of Dr. Deaver’s brilliance?

As Margaret puts her job on the line and takes risks she never thought herself capable of, she continues her carefully structured life in a quaint remote cabin left to her by a great-aunt. Margaret drives a 20-year-old Toyota truck, reads mysteries, gardens and wears a different flora- or fauna-themed shirt every day. A stray cat shows up on her doorstep and she surprises herself by taking it in.

And eventually, with a little help from her new friends, she solves the case.

I thoroughly enjoyed this warm and delightful book. Margaret is a wonderful character and the details of her life are charming. I hope she’ll be back for another gentle, fun sleuthing adventure.

Review: "It Could Have Been Her," Lisa Jewell

By Liz Soares
 

Lisa Jewell has combined darkness and light to create a perfect thriller.

 

The light is Jane Trevally, aged 55, who lives with her four dogs in Rosebery Hall, Dorset. The once-grand manse is falling down around her, and is filled with awful memories—Jane’s parents drank themselves to death and she had a miserable childhood.  But Jane is stuck, unable to move on.

 

Then an adorable Westie shows up on her property. Jane would be happy to add the pup to her pack, but feels she must at least try to find its owner. She learns the dog had been staying with a young woman in a neighbor’s Airbnb rental. She tracks his home to a mysterious corner of Hampstead Heath in London.

 

When she arrives at the house in the Vale of Heath, Jane has a flashback. She met a man in a bar in her 20s and he brought her back to this place, where he lived with his wife and two children. She felt anxious about the situation, and quickly left. She’s always felt that she escaped some kind of dire fate.

 

The story of the house and the people who live there is the dark side of It Could Have Been Her. In flashbacks, the man who answers the door to Jane and takes back Hugo, the Westie, tells his tale. Stuart is a gentle man who wants to drift through life. He was living in a squat (albeit a well-organized one) when he met Jessamine in a pub. He soon becomes involved with her highly dysfunctional life with her daughter, Daisy, and mother, Annie, in that sinister house in the Vale of Heath.

 

The family’s life slowly spins out of control, as told in alternating chapters with Jane’s investigation. She wants to know how Hugo ended up in Dorset, and what happened to the young woman he was with. She wants to know more about the people who live in the house. Had evil things really happened there, as she once suspected?

 

Oh, yes. And there’s even a clown involved.

 

Jane begins to fancy herself a private eye. She married two rich men—one a viscount. She was an excellent stepmother to their children and donated most of her divorce money to an animal shelter in Spain (where she volunteered for years), but other than that she’s never held a “real” job. Jane is feeling like she might have found a purpose in life.

 

She stays in her second husband’s London flat while he is in the States, and thinks maybe she would like to return to the city.

 

Jane is not a lonely “dog lady.” Apparently, she’s quite a looker and keeps up appearances with expensive haircuts and Botox treatments. She has a good relationship with her stepchildren, especially the loveable, flamboyant Dexter, whom she enlists in her investigation.

 

Readers met Jane in Jewell’s previous nail-biter, Don’t Let Him In. She was an old girlfriend of murder victim Paddy Swann and helped his daughter solve his case. I thought she was an interesting secondary character. I’m so glad Jewell has given her a chance to shine. And from the way Jane and Dexter were talking, there could be more cases on tap. Fingers crossed!

Review: "The Au Pair," Teddy Wayne

By Liz Soares

 

Steven Hammer published his first book, The Blooms of August, to great acclaim, but his second novel flopped. Now he does endless research on his current work of  "literary fiction," teaches a single college eriting course as an adjunct and plays competitive online "Risk."

Oh, the irony.

His wife, Lucy Myers, is beautiful and driven, too obsessed with the investment company (focused on operations that “do good”) she runs to pay much attention to their kids, Sophie and Caleb. She rakes in the cash and pays Steven a stipend to give him some pseudo independence.

Lucy is too busy to hire a new nanny after sweet, middle-aged Constanza dies on the job (of natural causes) in the couple’s luxurious Brooklyn apartment. And she doesn’t appear to notice that Steven is recommending a stunning young Norwegian to replace Constanza.

Of course, he did forward to Lucy the most unbecoming photo of Astrid he could find.

Astrid is a good nanny, though. She’s circumspect, serious and wants to be a writer. She gets the kids to eat fish! Eventually, she confides to Steven that she loved his second book. In fact, she idolizes him in her stoic and literal way. 

Steven falls hard. The two begin a torrid affair, which they somehow manage to keep secret. When the family heads to the Catskills for a two-week vacation at a posh rental, however, tensions reach the tipping point. Tragedy results.

The Au Pair is a compelling thriller with an undertone of wry, dark humor. Steven is a compromised protagonist. He is really selfish. And sometimes, spectacularly unmotivated. I spent half the book silently exhorting him to get off his duff and write. Steven faces a number of moral dilemmas. His approach to them is—interesting.

I did find it fascinating to contemplate what people will do for love. I remember when an acquaintance left his wife for another woman. I could see why he wanted to leave the wife, but not why he felt so strongly that he would leave behind his young son. It did have a detrimental effect on the child.

It was only later that I realized the new woman loved him and that was what he wanted and needed most of all.

I wasn’t able to cut Steven that much slack, though.

I finished this book in three days (typically I take five). I can’t say more about what happens to Steven, Lucy and Astrid without ruining the suspense for future readers. I can say that I suspect Steven was named for Mike Hammer, hero of Mickey Spillane’s PI novels. By the end of the book, Steven thinks he has found his writing voice again by writing a crime novel. And that really comes as no surprise at all.