Review: The First Emma by by Camille Di Maio

Still playing catch up on my ARCs.

Release Date: May 5, 2020

A fascinating true story about how a woman turns her husband's brewing company into an empire that survives Prohibition, after he is murdered by one of his mistresses. 

I knew nothing about Emma Koehler or Pearl Brewing before picking this up, but the only thing better than a dramatic story is one that's true, so I couldn't resist. It's a great story, but I think it could have been told in a slightly better way. It's as though the author attempted to tell it in dual time periods - one when Emma is elderly and hires a young woman to take notes for her autobiography, and the other as Emma's past. The problem is, we only get Emma's past as she's dictating it, so it's not always a true dual-time period story because we only really hear Emma telling us about her past, we don't get to actually see it very much. That was a little disappointing, and I felt like much of her accomplishments were brushed over, but it's still a great story about woman who wouldn't be held back by the personal tragedies that befell her. Not only did she rise above them, she became more successful and powerful than her narcissistic husband had been during a time when women didn't have the right to vote, and managed to maintain it through WWI, Prohibition, the Great Depression, and even the start of WWII.

Additional dimension is added by exploring the fictional character Mabel Hartley, the notes taker. Rather than just being a means of storytelling, she provides a much needed happier ending too.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: And They Called It Camelot by Stephanie Marie Thornton

Release Date: March 10, 2020 (still playing catch up on my ARCs, sorry)

This fictional account of Jackie Kennedy's life, as told through her own eyes, was pulling me in all different directions emotionally. On one hand, I could really see why she fell so hard for Jack, and even why she stayed with him through all his infidelity. On the other hand, her choice of men in general had me smacking my forehead. 

I didn't know much about Jackie before reading this. Obviously, I knew about the eventually tragic fates of her family members, and that she remarried at some point. This book really highlights how tragic her life was, and how she never really recovered from losing the love of her life, but also shows how strong she was to endure everything she did, and eventually find her own way in the world, in spite of the crappy way the men in her life treated her. Absolutely heartbreaking but also uplifting.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: American Princess: A Novel of First Daughter Alice Roosevelt by Stephanie Thornton

Release Date: March 12, 2019

As the title says, this is a novel of Alice Roosevelt, the eldest daughter of Theodore Roosevelt. Always having a complicated relationship with her father, she adored him but he kept her at arms length since she reminded him too much of her deceased mother, the love of Teddy's life. Yet she was easily the most like him in personality; unapologetically strong willed, strong minded, and outspoken with a quick wit, she was likely trying to emulate him to gain his approval, and in the process made herself into one of the most fascinating characters in American political families. The daughter of this larger-than-life American president is often in her father's shadow, but deserves her own spotlight, and this book more than does her justice. I knew from the moment I started reading this, from the very first paragraph, that I would love this book and Thornton's portrayal of Alice, and I did. So well written with such great characters, this is definitely not one to miss.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: The Huntress by Kate Quinn

Release Date: February 26, 2018

There are some books that are really difficult to review because it's difficult to express just how good it is, at least not without sounding like I'm gushing or fangirling all over. This is one of those books.

In the wake of WWII, an English journalist, American translator, and Russian female pilot track down a German Nazi murderess who committed horrific war crimes before fleeing to Boston where she embeds herself in an All-American family.

Kate Quinn is a master at weaving real history into fictional characters and stories. You might think the fact that they are fictional takes away from the impact of the story but it doesn't, because although the main characters are fictional, they are usually inspired by real life historical figures, and the plot based on real life historical events. And best of all, Quinn's hallmark is her strong and compelling, yet realistic heroines.

Like "The Alice Network", this one jumps back and forth in the timeline, but only over a span of about 10 years. We see the war only through Nina's eyes, a Russian pilot who grew up in the wilderness of Siberia with an abusive father. In the scenes after the war, it's told from the point of view of Ian, a former journalist turned war criminal tracker, and Jordan, a young woman in Boston who can't get passed the niggling thought that something isn't quite right with her seemingly perfect new stepmother.

It was a little frustrating to know the whole time where "the huntress" was hiding but the characters having no way of knowing that, but it did not detract from the enjoyment of the story. For a moment in the beginning, I thought maybe Nina's identity was stolen by the huntress, but then I realized that was silly, Kate Quinn doesn't really do twists like that. It's not a mystery. But it is an incredibly good story and I had great difficulty putting it down.

Advanced review copy from publisher via Edelweiss. My opinions are my own.

Review: The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict

Release Date: January 15, 2019

A great novel on an incredible woman. Honestly, if it wasn’t true, I’d hardly believe it. A Hollywood actress who escaped an abusive marriage and the Holocaust just before it came to her Austrian homeland, and became a self taught scientist and inventor, partnering with a musician to develop an unappreciated radio guidance system for torpedoes, which wasn't adopted by the US Navy until the 1960s, and later became the basis for Bluetooth and wi-fi. I know it almost sounds like I just strung a random selection of words together, but it's true and it rightfully makes a great story. My only criticism is that I felt like the ending was a bit of a let down, being somewhat anticlimactic, which I thought might be inevitable given Hedy's life story.

Hedy is a flawed but enormously strong and highly intelligent woman. She uses her beauty to the best of her advantage without compromising her integrity, yet she's not vain, and in some ways, her beauty is what holds her back, as so many people can't see beyond it. She is driven by her empathy and survivors guilt to aid the US military against Hilter. Fulfilling her acting obligations at the same time, she invents a radio guidance system that solves the problem of signal jamming, something no expert with formal education in the industry could do. Sadly, the government rejected her invention until the 1960s for a number reasons, none of them justified.

I feel a little bit like Hedy must have been something of an inspiration for Legally Blonde's Elle Woods: "Did she just wake up one morning and decide 'I think I'll go to law school'?" Did Hedy just wake up one morning and decide, 'I think I'll solve radio signal jamming today'? Of course, it wasn't that simple in reality, but it parallels the movie of an underestimated beautiful woman proving the world wrong and showing everyone just how smart and capable she really is, even if it took some time before they realized it.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: A Well-Behaved Woman by Therese Anne Fowler

Release Date: October 16, 2018

A leader of the woman's suffrage movement, Alva Vanderbilt (nee Smith) rejected much about the social convention of her time, and yet arguably also beat them at their own game. If you can't join them, beat them.

The first half of this was a little boring. I know it was setting the scene for Alva coming into her own later on, and we did get to see sparks of the woman she would become, but much of it was just inane snobbish chatter. I suppose it's fitting because that's probably exactly how Alva felt about it too, but it didn't make for the best reading. If we'd gotten to see a bit more of that sarcastic wit that occasionally flared up in Alva, even just internally, it probably would have been a lot more entertaining.

Additionally, I kept waiting for this to turn more political and see how Alva became so important to the suffrage movement, but we actually see very little of that, and only at the very end. It's definitely more about her earlier private life, which could have been more interesting if her characterization was fuller.

Still, watching Alva go from dutiful daughter, sister, wife, and mother to taking her fate and future into her own hands was very fulfilling and I was cheering her on the whole time. About the last third of the book is when it gets most interesting.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Sold on a Monday by Kristina McMorris

Release Date: August 28, 2018

An aspiring journalist takes a photo of questionable moral integrity, showing what the Great Depression has driven people to and it winds up being his big break. But when he returns to followup on it, he learns just how his photo and accompanying article has influenced the family in the photo and his niggling remorse over it turns into full blown regret and forces him to take a good, hard look at who he has become. Desperate to make things right, not only with the family, but also with his own parents and friends he has driven away, he embarks on a journey of atonement and self growth.

Based on a similar photo taken during the Depression (see below), the subject matter seemed compelling. It was very well written with well developed characters, but I felt like the plot dragged a little bit. I enjoy a good slow paced book, but sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't and this time it was more the latter. It wasn't a bad read, but it was not as 'powerful' as I thought it was going to be, given the subject matter.

The real life photo which
inspired this novel

I think particularly because the actual photo (in the novel) that wound up being published was staged, the whole book felt too far removed from the real and gritty hardships and desperation of the Great Depression. It was really more about the journalist's remorse over staging the photo and what it winds up doing to the family. The story follows him and his love interest, neither of whom are particularly struggling all that much and don't embody the true depths of despair that time period evokes. I felt like this really could have been placed during almost any time period - the question of what some journalists will sometimes do for a good story and how they deal with those questionable ethics is something that isn't exclusive to the Great Depression. I'm not saying that such a topic isn't worthy of a novel, but this is not what I expected it to be, and therefore it lost it's impact on me.

Additionally, I have to say - the idea that Ellis knew how to pick a lock with hair pins just because he had "a father who preferred tinkering with machinery to conversation" seem ridiculously unrealistic and contrived for the sake of the plot. Maybe if Ellis had an uncle or such who was a locksmith, that would have been more believable, even if still a little contrived. But I just don't know how the author is making the connection between the two. This alone wouldn't be enough for me to dislike it, but it was so silly, I couldn't let it go unmentioned.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own

Review: The Masterpiece by Fiona Davis

Release Date: August 7, 2018

Revolving around the Grand Central Terminal of New York City, we are told the story of two different women in two different time periods. Slow paced but beautifully written, we gradually learn about the growing success of illustrator and artist Clara Darden just before the Depression and a tragic accident ruins her life. Fast forward, Virginia Clay in the 1970s is still reeling from surviving breast cancer only for her husband to divorce her. When she stumbles upon an old art school that used to exist in the Grand Central Terminal, she suddenly finds meaning and purpose in discovering what happened to Clara Darden and who the mysterious artist who called himself 'Clyde' really was. That's not to say it's a mystery. This novel is very much about the journey and learning about the characters, who are well fleshed out.

I adored the detailed descriptions of artwork and fashion and although it was slow paced, it was never boring. I enjoyed reading about both women come into their own and rediscover themselves.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Side by Side by Jenni L. Walsh

Release Date: June 5, 2018

Intensely eventful, this sequel to Bonnie Parker's life details her crime spree with Clyde Barrow. Although the action never seems to stop, it also feels a little repetitive at times, like the entire book is just Bonnie and Clyde, and sometimes a few others, going around in circles, both literally and not. That's not a criticism, just a description of how crazy their crime spree was.

Popular view tends to paint the picture of Bonnie and Clyde on some kind of fun loving joyride as they commit their crimes, probably partly fueled by the famous photos of them showing off their guns and posing, horsing around, smiling, etc. But this book portrays things much more darkly, with their crimes being more like acts of desperation while they cling onto some fantasy that some day they'll achieve their dreams of living quietly in some remote corner of rural America, as though they are not haunted by the consequences of their choices.

At the same time, the historical view seems to describe the "Barrow Gang" as an organized criminal group, but this novel suggests it was anything but organized and more "fly by the seat of our pants" and "pick up whatever help we can from who we can whenever we can". We get to meet the members of Bonnie and Clyde's so-called gang, but many of them are involved at different time periods, typically not associated with each one another. It definitely felt too erratic to be called "organized", and it wasn't until near the end when it briefly becomes a large group.

Again, none of this is criticism, and it actually appears to be entirely accurate, but it was a little surprising, which made it all the more intriguing.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Between Earth and Sky by Amanda Skenandore

Release Date: April 24, 2018

A slow paced but poignant exploration of the treatment of Native Americans in history from the point of view of a young, coming of age girl. Alma, the main character, is a young white girl in a unique position of growing up among Native American children at her father's boarding school for "civilizing" them. Naturally, she befriends them, and like them, she is caught between two worlds, but does she truly understand them and their situation? As an adult, she has to the face the ghosts of this past.

I really enjoyed the way this story was told, set in two time periods but told in parallel to each other. I know lots of book have used this method before, but few do it quite so well as this one. It's slow paced, but never boring. The chapters set in 1906 hint and foreshadow at something significant that happened in the past, while the chapters set in the past slowly evolve to show you what happened. Eventually, the past catches up and it all comes to a head.

Beautifully written with realistic, three dimensional, sympathetic characters, and complex relationships, this is easily the best novel on this subject matter I've read so far. I definitely look forward to what this debut author has to offer in the future.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: The Witchcraft Delusion in Colonial Connecticut, 1647-1697 by John M. Taylor

The first few chapters are more of an overview of witch trials and how witchcraft was viewed in Europe and the colonies during the early modern period, but the majority of the book focuses on the details of some of the more notorious witch trials of Connecticut. The author is very condemning of the trials as acts of delusion (hence the title) and ignorance, but at the same time suggests that Elizabeth Seager deserved what she got because she was also convicted of adultery. As if adultery is a crime worthy of execution. Seager wasn't executed but could have been - after her conviction, she was only released on a legal technicality. Of course, the reader does need to keep in mind that this book was written in 1908, and is available for free in the public domain.

It is rather dry, but if you have an interest in the subject, it's well worth the read. I am descended from a couple of people who were involved in the trials as witness/juror so I wanted to find as many details about those cases as possible, and this certainly provided that. The majority of the info in my blog post about it here came from this book.

Review: You Were There Before My Eyes by Maria Riva

Release Date: October 10, 2017

A young woman, desperate to escape the dullness and rigidity of her rural, early 20th century Italian village and dazzled by stories of America, marries the first young man from her village to return there looking for a wife. He sweeps her off to Detroit, where they seek the American Dream.

I really struggled with this one because the dialogue was terrible, there wasn't much of a plot, the characters were flat, and the author liked to head-hop. While there's nothing wrong with a character novel that doesn't have much of a plot, or a plot driven novel that has somewhat one-dimensional characters - but there has to be a strength in one of them and this has neither. Add to it the cringe-worthy dialogue and the head-hopping narrative, and I just feel like it was poorly written.

It was disappointing because like many Italian-Americans, this story is one very similar to those of my own ancestors: from a rural Italian village, came to America in the late 19th/early 20th century as a young family seeking better opportunities for their future and their children's. It did reflect much of the cultural history I'd found in my genealogy research, but that's about the only good thing I can think to say about this novel. I so wanted to love this - hell, I would have settled for just liking it - but I couldn't.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: I, Eliza Hamilton by Susan Holloway Scott

Release date: September 26, 2017

This novel about the wife of Alexander Hamilton felt like it was missing something. I think it was the fact that there was no real antagonist or any main trial or obstacle for the protagonists to overcome. There were interesting events and hardships that cropped up but they were quickly resolved. I understand real history doesn't always lend itself to a clear antagonist or the arc of a good story line, but it's still necessary for a captivating novel.

I also felt there was too much "telling" and not enough "showing" which I felt made it more difficult to really connect with the characters.

It was well written though, and there were some very good scenes I enjoyed. I also couldn't help but picture Eddie Redmayne as Alexander for some reason, I guess because he had red hair in Pillars of the Earth, which certainly helped increase the enjoyment factor. But ultimately, I felt like portions of the book dragged, and the duel with Burr wound up rather anti-climatic.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Becoming Bonnie by Jenni L. Walsh

Release Date: May 9, 2017

This novel about Bonnie Parker, of the infamous Bonnie and Clyde, is so well written I didn't even notice at first that it's written in present tense, which I normally don't like.

The characterization was very well done too, with the best part being the evolution of Bonnie becoming the figure we picture her as (it's certainly an appropriately titled novel). Although this is a novel about how Bonnie met and fell in love with Clyde, I wouldn't call it a romance. It's more about a young woman finding herself in a chaotic world and learning what she really wants from it and from the people in her life. Blanche's character was compelling too and I almost wish for a sequel done in Blanche's voice. Knowing in real life, Blanche is the only survivor out of their group, her voice would make a good narrative for a sequel, but I don't know if the author has plans for a sequel at all.

Additionally, although Bonnie is a teenager throughout the book and there is nothing inappropriate in it for teens to read, I wouldn't call it a young adult novel (nor is it marketed as such, though I see some people on Goodreads have tagged it). Bonnie is very young, but she's very much living her life as an adult, and it deals with adult themes, so it doesn't have a young adult feel to it.

There are a few deviations from the factual timeline in the beginning but it does come together. At first, it seemed like Clyde was being introduced way too early, but then it became clear that he and Bonnie don't really formally meet until much later and so he was more of this shadowy, mysterious, background figure. It wound up working really well and made an excellent, believable story line. Keep in mind, this is not a tale of Bonnie and Clyde's life together, it's really about Bonnie's life before Clyde and everything that led them together. They don't really meet till near the end and the novel ends well before their crime spree. You might think that would make it boring, but it really doesn't. I read the entire second half of it in one day, I felt so compelled to finish it.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Alice and the Assassin (An Alice Roosevelt Mystery #1) by by R.J. Koreto

Release Date: April 11, 2017

Alice Roosevelt, spirited daughter of President Theodore Roosevelt, drags her bodyguard around New York to uncover a mystery relating to the assassination of President McKinley.

An entertaining enough fictional adventure, but I can't say I was hugely enthralled. Alice's character is amusing and I enjoyed the banter between her and her bodyguard, but beyond that it was an average plot with average writing. I could let the unrealistic places the daughter of the president wound up in and people she talked to slide, as unlikely as it was even given her very real spunky nature, it was plausible enough for the sake of a good story. Unfortunately, the plot just seemed to dragged on, despite being a very short 288 pages. It picked up at the end, but by then I'd already figured out what was going on.

I also frequently wished we could have seen Alice's point of view.

Good, fun characters with lively dialogue and banter, but everything else fell just a bit short of the mark.

Advanced review copy from publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: Girl in Disguise by Greer Macallister

Release Date: March 21, 2017

This book caught my attention because I loved the idea of a novel about Kate Warne, the first female Pinkerton agent, and I just hoped the writing, plot, and characters would be as good as the premise. I knew from the first few pages they would be.

Excellently written with great characters, fictional and historic alike, the plot takes the reader into the spy world of the Civil War. I did feel as though the romance was a little superficial, but otherwise, I felt the character development was very good, especially Kate's. Told in first person, we really get to see and feel Kate's thoughts and emotions, how she deals with the moral questions of lying, deceiving, and hurting people for the greater good, and how she deals with knowing she'll never have a normal, family life.

The plot is what really drives this though, and I frequently found it hard to put down, always wanting to know what would happen next. Lot's of action and adventure.

I'm interested in the author's first novel now. Though it wasn't a premise I was previously interested in, knowing how much I enjoyed this one, I have to give it a try.

Advanced review copy from the publisher via NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

Review: George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring That Saved the American Revolution by Brian Kilmeade

If you love the AMC TV show TURN: Washington's Spies, you'll love this non-fiction account of the same topic. I know the show was actually created from Alexander Rose's history book "Washington's Spies: The Story of America's First Spy Ring" but they were both on sale on Kindle and I couldn't decide so I just got both and wound up reading this one first. And honestly, I'm not sure how or why the show claims to be based on a non-fiction book when a non-fiction book is factual... so really, it's just based on history, and this is also a non-fictional book about that history.

I honestly had no idea just how important espionage was during the Revolutionary War. When I thought of this topic, I thought of what I learned in school: founding fathers, minutemen, Paul Revere, etc. But now I know it's so much more than that, and there was so much more going on in the background. They don't teach this in schools, but they should, maybe kids would pay attention.

Never boring or dry, this book really pulls you into the spy ring and let's you get to know each individual involved. At the end, it also explores who female agent 355 might have been. Sometimes, it's so juicy, I can't believe it really happened. It was interesting to compare and contrast it with the show too, which did add some fictional elements and make some changes, but not so much that it draws away from the real history, which makes me love the show even more.

This is precisely the kind of history book I would recommend to people who (wrongly) think history is boring, but it's also thrilling for those who already appreciate history. I don't think I've ever blown through non-fiction this fast.