Mini-Reviews: Rebekah Roberts Series

I have two sisters and I would classify them both as binge-readers.  I always have a book going. They go months without reading one and then whamo! They read like 12 in a month.  Lil' Sis (Lemon Drop's Mom for longtime blog followers...) joined the Summer Reading Program at her local library when she signed my niece up and proceeded to burn through the books (figuratively, not literally).  Invisible City is one of those books she tore through and recommended that I read.  And here we are.  I'm now caught up on the series to date.

Invisible City by Julia Dahl is the first book in the series and introduces the reader to Rebekah Roberts, a young (early 20s) reporter for the New York Tribune (think New York Post). Rebekah is a stringer - which means she goes where the paper sends her, she digs up details on a breaking story and phones it in to the desk for someone else to write.  She's sent to a scrap yard where the body of a young woman has been found, discarded like trash.  Turns out the woman is from the insulated Hasidic Jewish community, which is already closing ranks.  The whole story is challenging enough but then Rebekah meets Saul Katz, a cop, who tells her she "looks just like her mother."  Shocking since Rebekah's mother, also a Hasidic Jew, left the community to be with Rebekah's father, only to abandon her lover and newborn baby without a word.  As in, they have no idea if she's alive, dead, what the heck happened to her, abandoned.

As Rebekah works the story she finds herself learning more about her mother, a woman who has cast a long shadow and shaped her life by her very disappearance.  Dahl has taken a very women's fiction idea (a heroine coming to peace with her mother) and woven it into a mystery novel.  The world-building is very good, although Rebekah is a green reporter who makes some seriously bone-headed decisions in this book (my biggest gripe here).  But she's young and green and it's totally believable that she would make wrong moves as she's emotionally being battered by the ghost of Mommy Dearest.  Grade = B-

Run You Down picks up immediately where Invisible City left off and people, this book!  It's one of those incredibly shocking with the benefit of hindsight books.  It takes place during the Obama administration and white supremacists end up playing a hefty roll in the plot.  Given current affairs (see: Charlottesville...) Dahl comes off looking like a genius or someone who can see into the future (this was published in 2015).

A Hasidic man comes to see Rebekah.  He lives in upstate New York and his wife was found dead in their bathtub.  Everyone said it's a suicide because *gasp* she was on anti-depressants (a HUGE stigma in the community).  But he cannot believe it.  His wife would never abandon their infant son.  So he begs Rebekah to look into it, which she does.  And once again, the ghost of her mother is lurking in the shadows.

The author moves between alternating points of view in this story - giving us present day Rebekah as she works the story and her mother, Aviva, who tells the story of her past, how she came to abandon her daughter, and what her life has become.  Eventually both narratives collide, chickens come home to roost, and daughter finally meets her mother.

The dual narrative took some time for me to sink into, mostly because I was more interested in the mystery than in Aviva's point of view.  But once the author begins weaving the threads together, the suspense ratchets up and the ending is explosive, shocking, and upsetting.  White supremacists are involved, so that should give you the clue that things get very ugly, and no one is going to walk away unscathed.  Final Grade = B

As challenging and thought-provoking as Run You Down was, Conviction was at times an uglier read.  Rebekah is at loose ends, dissatisfied with work at The Trib following the events of the previous book.  She meets a woman who runs a crime blog who tells her she gets hundreds of letters from prisoners begging her to write about their cases. Rebekah is looking for a story that isn't tabloid trash and reads some of those letters. That's when she finds one sent by DeShawn Perkins, who as a teenager was convicted of the savage murders of his foster parents and toddler foster sister while they slept in bed in the summer of 1992.  DeShawn says he didn't do it, but what he claims was a coerced confession and an eye witness sealed his fate.  What catches Rebekah's eye about this letter?  One of the original officers on the case was none other than Saul Katz.

We have dual timelines with this story: 1992 when Saul and his partner catch the case and present day as Rebekah starts to dig.  What's coloring the edges of this story is the fact that in DeShawn's Crown Heights neighborhood in 1991 there was a riot ignited by tensions between the Hasidic Jewish community and Black residents.  The murder of DeShawn's family just one year after those riots changes everything for him with the consequences reverberating 20 years later.

Again, I wasn't as enamored with the dual narrative structure here but it's important because it unfolds DeShawn's story and sets the stage for Rebekah's digging into it in 2017.  What soon becomes evident is that there's plenty of blame to go around and it will unearth secrets that many people would love to see stay buried.  I'm not going to lie, this is an upsetting read.  In part because it shows us that gray area where "good people" make horrible choices based on the idea that "well, so what about that guy, he's not my problem."  There's an inhumanity here that is upsetting in it's subtlety and Dahl unearths all the ugly racism and prejudices that can lurk below the surface, undetected, until they either boil over or someone takes the lid off the pot to send it into the atmosphere.  It's not an easy read but it's compelling and remarkable.  Grade = B+

Genre fiction (of all stripes) tends to get labelled as fluffy, brain candy more often than not.  This trilogy is a perfect example of how something as "entertaining" as genre fiction can also be thought-provoking.  These are the sorts of mysteries that you could recommend to someone who says, "I only read serious fiction!" or to a book club group who sniffs disdainfully at your leisure reading.  There's a lot to unpack in all three of these stories, and read as a set of three, it's a fine achievement.

The last book came out in 2017 and I hope the author isn't finished with Rebekah. She sets things up in the final book that could take her heroine off into some interesting directions and it seems a shame to waste such a lovely series idea.  But, Dahl is also a journalist so - who knows?

I know this blog is mostly read by romance readers, and I will say that while Rebekah does date, there's really no romantic story arcs to be found in these books.  That said, there's a lovely friendship between Rebekah and her roommate, along with all that baggage to unpack with Mommy Dearest.  While the books are challenging reads, justice and the truth do come out in the end - but not without collateral damage.

Review: Come Back to the Ballpark, Maisy Gray

Anyone who has followed this blog for even a short period of time will know that Wendy, she has a complicated history with sports romance.  Girls like sports. And when I read a sports romance that blatantly gets sports wrong - the kind of wrong that basic research would have prevented - I get cranky.  Irrationally cranky.  Because then I picture the author and/or editor sitting at the desk going "Meh, romance readers won't care. As long as the hero is sexy and the sex is smokin' hot it's all good!" 

No.  No, it is not.

Come Back to the Ballpark, Maisy Gray by Cynthia Tennent is the first in a series set in fictional Comeback, Indiana and it's got a baseball plot.  Baseball being Wendy's first love.  For the most part?  Sometimes the baseball "stuff" in this story feels "major league" and sometimes it feels "minor league."  And since it's a romantic comedy?  Minor league probably would have been a better fit.  Still, while the Inside Baseball stuff isn't perfect, it's also not egregiously terrible - and believe you me, I've read some laughably bad baseball romances in my day.  But yeah, baseball - who cares right?  What about the romance?  Well, that's also kind of a mixed bag.

Maisy Gray and Kevin Halderman were childhood sweethearts - to the point where Maisy found herself head cheerleader for "Team Kevin," shared his love of baseball, was his scout, part-time coach and champion.  Kevin went on to become a big-league pitcher for his hometown (expansion) team, Indianapolis Turbos.  Maisy was always at the ballpark, cheering on Kevin and the team. Even though her mother is living with a chronic illness and she's got her own career as a teacher.  Maisy is always there with her little rituals and her Dubble Bubble, supporting her man.

And then her man dumps her for a supermodel because OF COURSE HE DOES!

It's been three years and ever since Kevin dumped her his career has been in a spiral and she's avoided baseball.  That is, until she takes her students on an end-of-the-year field trip to the game.  Oh, and it just happens to be Kevin's turn in the rotation.  Great.  But Maisy sucks it up, after all nobody will see her sitting in the bleachers, and the kids will love it.  Then her section wins one of the in-between-innings door prizes (hello jumbotron!), Kevin pitches a no-hitter and everyone finds out that Maisy was back in the stadium.  Baseball fans and players are nothing if not superstitious.  Now it's pandemonium to get Maisey back to the ballpark.

Sam Hunter is the youngest General Manager in the major leagues and had big plans to trade Kevin and his albatross contract.  Then the guy pitches a no-hitter sending his plans up in smoke.

Aside: this is one of the things that makes no sense. Kevin actually pitching a no-hitter would make him easier to trade and Sam would probably get better prospects in return.  The only reasons he couldn't trade him would be because the fans would hate it (um, so what?) or the owner would be cranky enough to fire Sam.  But the author never really comes out and says, "Sam can't trade Kevin because the owner will fire him."  None of this felt right.  Back to our regularly schedule program:

And now there's all this talk about Maisy and her being a good luck charm and Sam is pressed into duty to get the girl to come back.  The fly in the ointment?  The girl would rather be boiled in oil.  So it's up to Sam to pull out all the stops to get Maisy back in the ballgame.

I slogged on and off through this book, mostly because I'm a baseball nerd who nitpicks everything to death and also because Sam manipulates Maisy to get what he wants.  Well, maybe not what HE wants, but to get sports talk radio and the owner off his back.  And it doesn't always leave behind the best taste in my mouth.  Where this book sings is with Maisy.  You feel for this girl from the very first page.  Here's a woman who supported her man, stroked his ego, helped him get to where he is and he dumps her for a supermodel.  I mean, how can I hate on a book that features moments like this one:

Once more, she could be the cute little sidekick. The lucky charm. What a wonderful example she was to little girls everywhere. You can't play the game, but you can smile in the stands and be the cheerleader with the magic touch. Ugh.

There's a self-awareness in this story, especially with the female characters (Maisy's Mom and her married-with-two-kids BFF, Heather are fantastic - heck, even the supermodel is pretty great!) that helped elevate this book for me.  Yes, I nit-picked the baseball stuff but the female characters are so, so good.

The writing is solid and the author has a good ear for romantic comedy.  I did feel like the pacing was off, especially at the end when I felt this book had, like, 3 natural "end points" but kept going past the first two.  "My Kindle says 75% - is this the end of the story and the rest is stuffed back matter?  No, no it is not.  There are more chapters here...."  So yeah, it felt like it kept going and going there at the end.

But still - a sports romance that I didn't want to completely set on fire, bury and then dance on the grave?  Probably not a win, but not a loss either.  There's no ties in baseball but I'm calling this one a draw.  Because I'd read this author again and I'll probably read the next book in this series.

Final Grade = C+

Footnote: If there's any justice in the world, the supermodel will get her own romance.  That needs to happen.

Edited to Add 8/31/18: Please note that at the time this review was posted the digital edition was only available via Amazon.

Top 4 Unusual Historicals for August 2018

Normally my “sweet spot” for these posts are to find four or five books, preferably published during the month of the blog post, that feature “unusual elements.” “Unusual” typically takes the form of non-UK settings, “nobody” main characters that aren’t titled, unique professions etc. But when I started looking for titles to feature for August? Yeah, pickings were slim. So I did what any good librarian does - I whined on Twitter, got some suggestions, did some more investigating and now we have an August Unusual Historicals list! Huzzah!

Forbidden Night with the Prince by Michelle Willingham

A lifetime of being good…

One night of sin!

A Warriors of the Night story: virtuous Joan de Laurent is fated never to marry. Three betrothals, each ending in the groom’s death, have convinced her she’s cursed! But only her hand in marriage can help darkly brooding Irish prince Ronan win back his fortress. To break the curse, Joan must risk all to spend one forbidden night with the royal warrior…

Willingham does write in the Regency era (mostly for Amazon Montlake these days) but her medievals for Harlequin Historical are personal favorites. She’s got a great handle on the time period, has written stories all over the island (check out her Ireland-set MacEgan series!), and there’s usually plenty of angst-o-rama-jama to make my heart sing.

Joy to the Earl by Nicola Davidson

Shunned for his mismatched eyes and awkward limp, Yorkshire carpenter Jack Reynolds lives a lonely and impoverished existence. Then comes a shocking discovery: he’s the discarded heir of a wealthy noble family, and if he travels to London by Christmas, he’ll not only gain an earldom, a home, and position like he’s never dreamed, but maybe—just maybe—he can finally lose his damned virginity.

Scandalous widow Rosalind Nelson’s life centers around four things—her young daughter, helping couples suffering sexual discord, avoiding all peers, and definitely not falling in love. That is, until the day she rescues a mysterious stranger from a carriage accident. Kind, brave, and achingly seductive, Jack is everything she’s ever wanted. Nothing can destroy their growing bond…except the demons of his past...

This book was previously published in the anthology A Very Wicked Christmas.

This previously published novella popped up on my radar thanks to a Twitter friend. Thank you Twitter friend! For those of you looking for steam, Davidson writes the sexy times and what could be sexier than a carpenter virgin hero? I may have broken a nail one-clicking this...

The Duke with the Dragon Tattoo by Kerrigan Byrne

The bravest of heroes. The brashest of rebels. The boldest of lovers. These are the men who risk their hearts and their souls―for the passionate women who dare to love them…

He is known only as The Rook. A man with no name, no past, no memories. He awakens in a mass grave, a magnificent dragon tattoo on his muscled forearm the sole clue to his mysterious origins. His only hope for survival―and salvation―lies in the deep, fiery eyes of the beautiful stranger who finds him. Who nurses him back to health. And who calms the restless demons in his soul…

A LEGENDARY LOVE

Lorelai will never forget the night she rescued the broken dark angel in the woods, a devilishly handsome man who haunts her dreams to this day. Crippled as a child, she devoted herself to healing the poor tortured man. And when he left, he took a piece of her heart with him. Now, after all these years, The Rook has returned. Like a phantom, he sweeps back into her life and avenges those who wronged her. But can she trust a man who’s been branded a rebel, a thief, and a killer? And can she trust herself to resist him when he takes her in his arms?

Brutal honesty time: I completely skipped over this book when I saw “Duke” in a title that plays up another famous book title (I seriously hate that). I get it. Most readers see “Duke” and can’t grab the book fast enough. Me? Not so much. Then I stumbled across reviews at The Day Job. The hero has to be nursed back to health after crawling out a mass grave (!) and when he’s reunited with the heroine he’s now a “lethal pirate captain.” There’s also a treasure hunt and what Library Journal describes as “the darker side of the Victorian Age.” So, of course, I put myself on a waitlist for this at the office. Because, of course!

The Mysterious Lord Millcroft by Virginia Heath

Life as a duchess…

Or something much more dangerous?

Part of The King’s Elite: constantly told her beauty and charm are all she has to offer, Lady Clarissa is intent on marrying a duke. And intriguing spy Sebastian Leatham will help her! Only, first she’ll assist him with his new assignment—playing the part of confident aristocrat Lord Millcroft. Sebastian awakens a burning desire within Clarissa that leaves her questioning whether becoming a duchess is what she truly longs for…

Again, another title I skipped over (at first) because the back cover blurb makes it sound like your run-of-the-mill Regency spy story. But when I whined on Twitter about this blog post with, “I need historicals that aren’t another Girl Falls In Love With Duke story….” the author responded with, “I've got a girl who thinks she wants a Duke but actually falls for a shy nobody story.” O.M.G. Ladies and gents, that’s an elevator pitch right there! Print is out in August, but y’all need to wait for September 1 for the ebook.

What Unusual Historicals are you looking forward to this month?

#TBRChallenge 2018: Law of Attraction

The Book: Law of Attraction by Allison Leotta

The Particulars: Legal Thriller (with romantic elements), Book #1 in Anna Curtis series, 2010, In Print

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: I failed to catalog this one, but I suspect I picked it up at the RWA conference in Anaheim in 2012.  Reading a friend's GoodReads review, the author was there, and since it was a local conference for me, I basically took any book that wasn't tied down.  I'm a mystery/suspense reader from way back, hence why this one has survived various TBR purges over the last couple of years.

Trigger Warning: Domestic Violence

The Review: I've been slogging through romance, of late, but it's an affliction that hasn't hit my mystery/suspense reading.  Partly because I have very warm, squishy nostalgic feelings for that genre (it's the genre that made me fall in love with reading) but also in a world on fire the very real promise that the bad guy will be caught, and justice served, hits my sweet spot.  Case in point, this book.  Oh, there are issues - but they didn't keep me from inhaling this 400 page book in one day.

Anna Curtis is a fresh-out-of-law-school Assistant US Attorney pulling duty in the Domestic Violence Paper Room.  An assignment that is crap on a good day, let alone the day after Valentine's Day when domestic violence cases surge.  After getting a particularly foul cup of cafeteria coffee she heads back to her office where she catches Laprea Johnson's case.  Laprea is basically bleeding all over one of her crappy office chairs, having just taken a beating from D'marco Davis, father of her children (fraternal twins).  Laprea is determined to press charges and the case hits Anna close to home.  She's determined to help the young woman.  The fly in the ointment?  D'marco's attorney is Nick Wagner, a former law school acquaintance who Anna coincidentally ran into at the court house just moments before.  The attraction is immediate, with Nick asking her out on a date.  Then they find out they're going to be working a case on opposite sides of the aisle.

What happens next is what sadly happens in a lot of domestic violence cases.  Laprea changes her story, D'marco walks, and a couple of months later?  Laprea is dead.  D'marco is the obvious prime suspect.  However, by this point, Anna and Nick are in a full-fledged love affair.  When she finds out he plans to continue being D'marco's lawyer?  Yeah, that puts an end to that.  Next thing she knows, because of her knowledge of the previous case, she's assigned to work with Jack Bailey, the top homicide prosecutor in the city.  He's none to thrilled to have a rookie with zero homicide trial experience dogging his heels but the boss says she's in, so now he's got Anna as his second chair.

Naturally though, things aren't as they seem - and further complicated by the fact that Anna, who has obviously never watched a single Law & Order episode in her life, fails to disclose her previous romantic relationship with the defense counsel.  Yeah, that's going to come back to bite her in the ass later.

And that would be the main issue I have with this book - Anna is young, green, fresh out of law school, and makes some bone-headed decisions over the course of the story.  But I could roll with it because her instincts are mostly good and Leotta writes the hell out of this story.  It's firmly third person, but the author shifts character points-of-view to keep the proceedings lively and the pages turning.  Which is no small matter given that I pretty much had this mystery unraveled fairly early on as the author tips her hand way too early with those point-of-view shifts. 

Leotta lays out the challenges of prosecuting domestic violence in a compelling (and depressingly) realistic manner, structures a good sense of place around D.C. (I felt like I was THERE), and features a nicely diverse cast of law enforcement characters (there's an equal mix of white and black lawyers and cops).  No, it's not perfect - but it's an example of a book finding me in the right mood, at the right time.  I'll be reading the next book in the series.

Final Grade = B-

#TBRChallenge Reminder: August 15!

Hey, hey, hey!  For those of you participating in the 2018 #TBRChallenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, August 15.  The theme this month is Series.

If ever there was a "shooting fish in a barrel" theme - this is it.  Any book that is part of a series that's languishing in your TBR.  Given that stand-alone books are the proverbial unicorn, this should be a fairly easy month to go "on-theme."

However, let's say you do find a unicorn (stand-alone) book in your TBR and it's hitting you in all your sweet spots.  Hey, no problem!  Remember that the themes are optional and really, you can read whatever you want.  The whole point of the TBR Challenge is to read something that has been languishing in your TBR.

Reminders:

1) If you're participating via social media, remember to use the #TBRChallenge hashtag

and 

2) You can get further details and links to all the blogs participating on the 2018 TBR Challenge Information Page.