Review: The Ivory City

The Ivory City by Emily Bain Murphy turned out to be one of my more pleasant surprises in my reading year thus far for 2026.  A near perfect blend of historical mystery and romance, and it should satisfy fans for both genres.

Grace Covington was marked as a poor relation even before she was born because her mother had the temerity to marry for love - to a man well below her station. A fact that Grace's Aunt Clove never lets her forget. However, it's her uncle who is her mother's blood relation, and Grace has been allowed to spend time with her cousins, Lillie and Oliver, growing up - and the cousins adore each other. So when Lillie and Oliver want Grace to come to their home in St. Louis for the 1904 World's Fair, of course she goes. She's not about to miss out on the biggest event of her young life!

But alas, there are secrets a plenty. Oliver has fallen head over heels for an actress (a fact that will surely kill Aunt Clove) and only Grace knows about the relationship. Lillie is determined to do more with her life than be a pretty socialite, and is sneaking out of the house to work with a local doctor at a women's clinic (in case Aunt Clove survives Oliver's secret) - again, another fact that only Grace knows about. Another mark against Grace? Her troubled brother Walt, who fell down the rabbit hole of addiction and has not been seen by the family for the better part of a year. As if Grace's father owning a restaurant wasn't scandalous enough!  

These secrets and the added tension of class differences boil over when a member of their merry group of friends attending the Fair is murdered - and Oliver becomes Prime Suspect #1.  Grace knows deep in her bones that he's innocent and helping her in her sleuthing is wealthy Theodore Parker - a man she has an Enemies To Lovers vibe with ever since they had a disastrous run-in with each other at a Chicago soirée. 

This was a really pleasant and enjoyable story even if it does take a while to come to a boil. The author did not skimp on her research and it shows up tremendously with her world building. I truly felt like I was at the 1904 World's Fair and she spends the first 30% or so of the book really digging into her characters so that by the time the murder happens you actually give a damn. 

Speaking of the murder, there's plenty of twists and turns along the way and the author kept me guessing. On the romance front, the author does an amiable job playing with the adversarial Enemies to Lover trope by having Grace and Theodore rub each other in all the right and wrong ways. There's a moment in the final chapters where I thought the author might break the BIG cardinal rule of the romance genre, but rest assured for romance fans, it ends happily for Grace and Theodore. In fact it ends happily for most of the characters, other than the murder victim and, well, the murderer (duh). 

Finally, besides the world building, I really appreciated the time and care the author spent using class differences as part of the conflict. Americans just love to pretend like we're not classist pieces of crap like our British counterparts, but rest assured we were and still are. It was nice to read a historical mystery that didn't sweep this under the rug. 

This was a very enjoyable read and I'm glad I took a chance on it. Murphy has also written middle grade and young adult, and this is only her second adult novel. I'm hoping she has more historical mysteries with romantic elements up her sleeve.

Final Grade = B+

#TBRChallenge Review: Presumed Guilty

The Book: Presumed Guilty by Tess Gerritsen

The Particulars: Romantic suspense, Harlequin Intrigue #238, 1993, (maybe) out of print - hard to say it's been reprinted a bunch!, available digitally - and at the time of this posting through Kindle Unlimited

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: I discovered Gerritsen through her Rizzoli & Isles suspense series, so of course I went back and collected her romantic suspense backlist. 

The Review: I have zero patience for readers who poo-poo Gerritsen's romance past. I contend what makes her a successful suspense writer IS her romance past. She excels at writing relationships (romantic or otherwise) and she doesn't shy away from emotion. All good fiction needs emotion or else why are we even bothering? That said, even I'll admit her romantic suspense backlist has been hit or miss for me so far. This one was mostly a hit that I inhaled in two sittings, but the reader has to accept a couple of things or it's just not going to work.

First, this book was first published in 1993. It's set in a very small town on an island off the coast of Maine. As someone who remembers the 1900s and grew up in and around small towns - yes, people really did leave their homes unlocked and the keys in their cars (and yes, cars had keys not ignition buttons...).

Also, a reminder that once upon a time Harlequin would take a chance on a risky premise. This one is even risky by today's standards - the heroine has just broken off an affair with her married boss.  Naturally she believed all his pretty little lies, until she no longer did. Which makes her a dumb bunny, but I would argue a believable dumb bunny. As far as any 1990s grossness that creeps into the text? Not as much as I've seen in other books from this era. There's the obvious slut shaming and misogyny and the hero is described as having "Gypsy eyes" - but other than that? I mean, kind of par for the course for 1993. 

The story opens with Richard Tremain (said married man) calling our heroine, Miranda Wood, begging her to take him back. Miranda has had enough. At one point she thought she loved Richard, she thought he was "a good man" (I mean, other than the cheating on his wife thing...) but soon his carefully crafted mask starts to slip and she realizes she doesn't know Richard at all. She's broken it off and given her letter of resignation at the small town newspaper that Richard's family has owned and run for generations. Richard says he's coming over and Miranda decides to leave thinking he'll give up once he sees she's not home. She goes for a walk along the coast, a suitably crap alibi because nobody sees her. Why would Miranda need in alibi? Well once she gets home she finds Richard, naked, stabbed to death in her bed, with one of her kitchen knives. 

Miranda is arrested in short order and the grieving widow calls her estranged brother-in-law, Chase Tremain. Chase had a falling out with his brother years ago and has built a life for himself away from Maine and away from the Tremain money - Chase being the black sheep of the family. But his brother is now dead and that changes everything. It robs Chase of a chance of the possibility of amends and forgiveness. He's all set to tar and feather Miranda until he sees her in the police station and overhears her interrogation (small towns AMIRITE?!). Suddenly he's not so sure. He becomes less sure when a mysterious benefactor posts Miranda's bail and an attempt (the first of many) is made on her life. As they cautiously team up and start digging they realize that more than one person in that small town may have had reasons for wanting Richard dead.

The suspense plot is very good and kept me greedily turning the pages. You've got a vengeful (like, duh) widow, her pompous Big Fish Small Pond father, her two kids (the golden boy heir, the neglected ugly-duckling daughter), the staff of the newspaper, a development deal threatening protected coastal land, oh and the minor fact that the murder victim couldn't keep it in his pants. Richard was the type of guy always looking for validation, for adoration and a fan club. He went chasing after his wife looking for just that, but realized too late that given who her father is he couldn't just dally with her and toss her aside. So he traps himself into a marriage and continues to collect mistresses like Pokémon cards. He strings them along until he gets bored, and/or someone newer and younger rolls into town. He breaks it off with them, not vice versa. Miranda calling it quits first puts a dent in his considerable ego. 

The romance on the other hand is a bit harder to swallow - I mean, the heroine was having an affair with the hero's married brother. She's a perfectly OK character, albeit too trusting and naïve which lands her in the affair. She's worked past that by the start of the first chapter but I suspect some readers will take issue with her character. Me? I mean, not so much. Should she have had an affair with her married boss? Absolutely not. Did she fall into a sad story that A LOT of women fall into? Yes, she did. So while she is a dumb bunny, again, believable dumb bunny. She also has enough starch in her spine after she's arrested for murder that you can't help but root for her. 

There's obviously trust issues that simmer for most of the story. It certainly seems like there is more to the story of who killed his brother, but that doesn't mean Chase entirely trusts Miranda. Even after he witnesses the first attempt on her life he's not completely there - mostly there, but not completely. I will say the author does the smart thing by not having them fall into bed right away. They do eventually have a perfunctory, PG-ish sex scene, mostly because I think the Intrigue line dictates it, but I think this would have worked better for me had it been jettisoned completely. I mean, it's a lot for a romantic couple to overcome!

Gerritsen rounds out the story with interesting secondary characters (there's an older woman named Lila St. John and her Portuguese Water Dog that were real stand-outs) and throws in enough blind alleys on the mystery of who killed Richard that I didn't want to tear myself away.  No small feat these days when few books seem to be holding my attention.

Final Grade = B 

Little Miss Crabby Pants Explains Why Your Library's eBook Collection Sucks

Folks, I tried. I normally do my level best to keep Little Miss Crabby Pants chained up in that dark corner of my brain, but like a moron I've been spending too much time library doom-scrolling on Threads. Yes, this rant is brought to you by social media, as most rants are. 

Because the algorithm loves to keep us cranky and angry, I get pushed a lot of library-related content on Threads, which makes sense given that I, myself, am a librarian. Unfortunately, given my years of experience (27 years) and that I'm on the younger side of Gen X (1965-1980), it also means I hit my Cranky Sea Hag Era in the profession about five years ago and I'm still a decade plus away from retirement. Yes, it's happened. I am officially The Battle Ax Librarian. I'm still nice to Library Kids, but it's probably a good thing they've got me locked up in administration now. 

It's not unusual to putz around on Threads and see people asking questions about Libby or Hoopla, both library digital lending services, and most of these questions revolve around "Where Can I Get More Library Cards To Get More Check-outs, Titles, Shorter Waitlists etc."  First, I want to preface this by saying people should absolutely get library cards from where ever they are entitled.  Many libraries have reciprocal borrowing agreements that allow people to get cards in neighboring jurisdictions.  Also some libraries (the completely insane ones, IMHO - more on that in a minute) will allow folks to pay a yearly fee for an out of resident card.  The reason why people are asking these questions is usually prefaced by OMG I'M #659 IN LINE FOR YESTERYEAR!!!!!! WHY WON'T THE LIBRARY JUST BUY MORE COPIES?!?!?!?!? While I'm at it why aren't public libraries open 24 hours with cute cafes in them where I can buy coffee and a muffin?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Now there are some folks on Threads who have way more patience than I do and will calmly explain to these folks, whereas I have to sit on my hands and stop myself from screaming at my phone.  But hey, I still have the stone tablet equivalent of Internet communication - A BLOG! So folks, I am now word vomiting my feelings here so it can be my "Don't Make Me Tap the Sign Again" when I see this type of discourse on social media.  Buckle up kiddies, Auntie Wendy is going to give you some hard truths.

OverDrive holds the marketshare on public library eBook and digital audiobook lending in the United States. Their app is called Libby. Not every book under the sun is on Libby because libraries have to purchase the content that goes in their collection. So if you don't see Book X in your Libby app? Your library hasn't purchased it for whatever reason - oh let's be honest, we didn't purchase it because our budgets stink.  Anyway, that's lesson number 1. Lesson number 2 is that while Authors Guild is complaining that "free library lending" is undercutting author's pay (no, it's not) and there's "no more friction because people don't have to visit physical library buildings anymore" (apparently 6 month wait lists aren't friction - sure Jan), the fact of the matter is public libraries are being price gouged into oblivion by publishers.  Here's a quick example:

Ironwood by Michael Connelly (2026)

Retail Amazon eBook $14.99

Retail Audible Audiobook $19.68

Library eBook $75.00 for 24 months

Library Audiobook $88.99 for 24 months

Amazon Print Copy $14.99

Library Print Copy $17.28 (discounts vary by library / contract, this is my library's discount) 

Yes, that's right - libraries are paying that price for one copy, that can be checked out by one user at a time, for just 24 months. After 24 months the license expires and we have to repurchase.  Do we get a cost break when purchasing a license for a second time?  Ha ha ha ha! Oh, you sweet summer child - no.

But Little Miss Crabby Pants, that's a new book! What about an older title?  So glad you asked... 

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson (2008)

Retail Amazon eBook $6.99

Retail Audible Audiobook $19.69

Library eBook $27.50 for 12 months or $55.00 for 24 months

Library Audiobook $95.00 for perpetual license (no expiration date) or $47.50 for 12 months

Amazon Print Copy $8.29

Library Print Copy $11.21

Let's do some math. If we want to keep the holds list at a manageable 5 holds for every 1 copy and there are 500 holds on Ironwood in eBook format - the library would need 100 copies, which will cost us $7,500 for licenses that will expire in 24 months. Oh, and by the way, y'all expect to go into library buildings and have staff there to help you, not see empty shelves, and not see books falling apart in need of replacing.  Oh, and you expect libraries to actually be open.  Newsflash, all this costs money. Seriously, I don't get enough credit for not screaming at people on Threads. 

Well, OK that stinks, but I'm a Hoopla user and I'm annoyed that I'm only allowed X number of check-outs every month. Surely libraries can do better than that!  Oh, you sweet summer child, you would be wrong. Let Little Miss Crabby Pants educate you.

When Hoopla came into being it was a streaming movie platform only. A bunch of libraries signed on because they were first out of the gate with streaming movie content for libraries and this was back in the days when Netflix was the shiny new thing in the consumer market for streaming. Over time Hoopla added more modules to their platform including music, eBooks, audiobooks, and comics. What they did not do is offer libraries an option to opt out of modules. If you were a Hoopla library you got access to  all modules whether you wanted them or not. 

The great thing about Hoopla is that most of what's available on the platform is instant access (some libraries also purchase content for Hoopla like Libby, but for the sake of this post I'm just going to focus on instant access).  This means there are no wait lists for users. Also the library doesn't pay for the content until someone checks it out. Cost per check-out on Hoopla ranges anywhere from under $1 and caps at $3.99. This can be good for libraries because a lot of what's in the Hoopla catalog may only check-out once (if even that....) and it makes sense to pay $2.99 for an eBook just one person is interested in than the cost of a metered access (24-months) license with Libby.  

Hoopla negotiates with content providers to make titles available on the platform and the library gets what it gets. These contracts mean that some publishers have an embargo in place (for example that new eBook title might not be available on Hoopla until after 6 months from publication date) and some publishers won't do business with Hoopla at all (there are no Penguin Random House titles available using the instant access model). The reason for this is Hoopla caps the cost-per-check-out price at $3.99.  They'd offer movies from the Marvel universe if the studio was willing to cap the price at $3.99, but they aren't - so that's why that thing you want might not be on Hoopla.

This sounds like a great deal, right? Wrong. It's very hard for libraries to manage costs with Hoopla. Basically the more we promote it, the more people use it, the more it costs libraries. And newsflash, library collection budgets have either remained stagnant for decades (as it's become expected for us to purchase more and more formats....) or we've actually lost money - either physically or just through the simple math of inflation. So libraries that offer Hoopla look for ways to curtail the spending so they can actually keep on track with their budget. They will limit the number of monthly check-outs or they will cap the number of check-outs each day, turning some users away and telling them to "try again tomorrow." The intractability of the company to allow public libraries to go to an a la carte model with the modules frustrates me no end. I oversee a Hoopla budget and in the past year we cut down our number of check-outs from 8 to 5. That said the monthly invoices are still 6-figures. Audiobooks make up roughly 60% of our check-outs every month. Wouldn't it make sense to jettison the less popular modules in favor of keeping the ones our customers are most interested in?  It would. But so far the company has been unmoved.  Another way libraries are curtailing Hoopla costs?  They've stopped offering it entirely. I've lost track of how many libraries have dropped Hoopla in the last year - a simple Google search on "hoopla ending" or "discontinue hoopla" will boggle your mind.

Which brings us back to a couple of points Little Miss Crabby Pants wants to drive home. No, Authors Guild, "free" library books is not the reason why authors can't make a living anymore. Sales were actually up last year (2025) but profits were down. What does that tell us?  Inflation is biting you in the ass just like it is your consumer base. That consumer base, even if they are highly educated and making a decent living, are still looking for ways to be frugal while paying higher prices in housing, groceries, energy, taxes and at the gas pump. So they're buying fewer books, waiting for sales, reading through their TBRs, willing to sit on a long library wait list or, just not read that book at all. 

And here's another newsflash - without libraries authors would sell a lot fewer books. A contributing factor on why author's are making less? Libraries are buying less (oh the irony, it burns) I'm sorry this Publisher's Weekly article is currently paywalled, but here's the salient point:

Sales through intermediates—largely wholesalers—fell 2.4% after dropping by just over 11% in both 2023 and 2024. The three-year drop is likely due to slower sales to libraries and, especially last year, trouble at Baker & Taylor, which went out of business at the end of 2025.

Baker & Taylor existed for 200 years and, at one point, held roughly 50% of the market share. As a librarian who had done business with B&T for my entire 27 year career I can tell you it was a few years of them circling the drain before they went out of business.  There were certain publishers who stopped providing them inventory unless they were paid upfront (you can't blame publishers here - B&T wasn't paying their bills) and libraries, by and large, aren't going to pay an invoice for something they haven't ordered or received yet. This led to delayed and sluggish sales and longer wait times for library customers. Now factor in shrinking library budgets due to loss of funds and/or inflation and if I was an author I would think about hitting the panic button now. 

But Sure Jan, "free library books" is why authors aren't making a living anymore and it has nothing to do with inflationary costs, libraries buying less or the fact there's been a 40% decline in reading for pleasure over a 20 year period. Look, librarians got enough problems right now, we don't need Authors Guild telling us "we're the problem." We might start to take it personally. 

So yes, this is why your library eBook collection sucks and this is why you're waiting 6 months for that hot bestseller in eBook or downloadable audiobook.

If you take nothing else away from this post, please take away this. Just take 25% of the energy you're using to snap up library cards like Pokémon and talk to your local library about their budget constraints and needs. Then take that information and contact your elected officials. Librarians scream from the hilltop all the time about our budgets. We back up that screaming with data and impact outcomes. Electeds are more likely to listen to constituents who go to the ballot box than librarians. Will this help? Maybe not in the immediate. There's waste, graft and corruption to fight through but if enough people mobilize on a grass roots level, if enough people agitate for change, just maybe we'll see some change. Because, fun fact, you hold the keys to them having a job. If the public library is important in your life, try doing something more about it than whining on Threads that you have to wait 6 months for a eBook copy of Yesteryear.  

Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is August 19

Another month, another month of the blog being The Dead Zone. Y'all I'm listening to audiobooks, but eyeball reading has been a challenge. Thank goodness for the TBR Challenge, I'm convinced I wouldn't get any reading done otherwise! Have I picked out a book yet for August? Of course not. Will that stop me from hitting my own self-imposed deadline? Um, probably not.  Cross your fingers y'all.

This month's challenge is set for August 19 and the optional theme is Backlist Banger.  This was another suggestion that came out of my annual theme poll and this should be low-hanging fruit. A couple ways to spin this might be picking up a book that's been in your TBR a long time or picking up a book by a favorite and/or prolific author.  Spinning up themes is highly encouraged with the TBR Challenge - we love to encourage creativity!

That said, I can totally relate to the fragile state of reading mojo - and sometimes you just have to go with the book calling your name in the hopes of finding something to lose yourself in for a few hours. If you just want to pick a random book out of your pile and call it good? That's OK! The goal of the Challenge is to read something, anything, that has been languishing.

It's never too late to sign up for the Challenge.  You can learn more about it, and see a list of who is participating, over at the #TBRChallenge 2026 information page.

Review: Unmask Alice

Like any self-respecting Gen-X girl, I read Go Ask Alice. Like a lot of teenage girls, I wasn't above consuming entertainment that leaned hard on tragedy and melodrama. Also, and this can't be overstated, if it was a banned book, I was more than likely going to read it. Which just goes to perfectly illustrate what book banners willfully refuse to grasp. Go Ask Alice is a laughably terrible book that should have faded into obscurity decades ago. It didn't for two reasons: Book banners and because people would rather look for a boogeyman to blame "the problem with kid's today" then dig deeper into what actually might be bothering them. 

Which brings us to Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World's Most Notorious Diaries by Rick Emerson. This largely tells the story of Beatrice Sparks a evangelical Mormon wife and mother who had a hardscrabble upbringing and put the hustle in hustler. Seriously, you'd admire her moxie if she wasn't such a trash human being who lies like a rug and leaves ruined lives in her wake, all to feed her own sense of hubris. Do I believe in Hell? I'm not sure. But gods forgive me, if there is one, I hope this woman is roasting. 

Sparks was trying to make her way hustling as a writer. This was back in the era when you could bang out a few hundred words here and there and maybe make a few bucks. Nobody could accuse Sparks of lacking ambition, she took jobs for free and fabricated credentials along the way, that of course nobody ever checked into, despite her habit of contradicting herself. Through a series of happenstance she falls into the orbit of Art Linkletter, one of the most trusted and "family friendly" entertainers of his day. In 1969, his daughter, Diane, commits suicide by jumping out a window - and the claim is that she was high on LSD and/or experiencing a "flashback" at the time. In his grief, Linkletter gets his wagon hitched to Nixon's War on Drugs, and for parents, already confused and slightly terrified by dirty hippies and the counter-culture movement, LSD became a convenient boogeyman to hitch their wagon to. Enter Sparks with the diary of a young woman she claims she counseled (by this point Spark was passing herself off as a counsellor heading down the road to eventually concoct a PhD and putting Dr. in front of her name). 

Go Ask Alice takes off like a rocket, and Sparks is seething. Like an idiot, even though she didn't want to, her name is nowhere on the book. Young Adult as a genre barely existed and her agent and publisher believed (rightly so) that young people wouldn't read the true diary of a young drug addicted girl if a grown-up's name was slapped on the front cover. So even though Alice was a success, it just made Sparks hungrier for her moment in the sun. Enter: Jay's Journal. 

I did know about the Satanic Panic of course - mainly through the very high profile cases of the McMartin Preschool Trial and West Memphis Three. What I didn't know is you can trace back the entire Satanic Panic nonsense to Sparks "editing" Jay's Journal. Jay was a real life Utah boy named Alden Barrett who committed suicide at 16. Emerson spends quite a bit of time laying out Alden's story by talking with his family, friends, and reading a self-published book written by his younger brother. Alden was exceptionally bright but also troubled. Then bake in he's growing up in conservative Utah where everybody is expected to toe the line and after he blows out the candles on his 18th birthday cake, he'll likely be dumped into the jungles of Vietnam to fight a hopelessly unwinnable war. After his death his parents are naturally bereft, and that's when they find his journal. Needing her son's death not to be in vain, thinking that maybe his journal could help other lost and confused young people, his mother gives his diary to the woman who helped so many others by "editing" Go Ask Alice. And that's when Hell is unleashed for this family.

Sparks changes some names and places, but does such a shit job of it that it doesn't take long for people in the Barrett's small town to fit the pieces together. The worst of it is that while Sparks does lift some whole passages out of Alden's journal, she infuses what people now think of as "his diary" with a bunch of Satanic Devil Worship BS that is completely fabricated out of whole cloth. Alden was conflicted about the religious beliefs of his family and his Utah small town, he excelled at debate and like most teenagers questioned absolutely everything, but a devil worshipping Satanist who was sacrificing animals and taking part in bizarre midnight rituals? Hardly. 

Jay's Journal landed at a time when teen suicide was on the rise, and human beings, if nothing else, prefer pat, easy answers. It's more desirable than the truth, which is often layered, complicated and messy. Why are teens killing themselves? It couldn't possibly be mental illness, questioning of identity, misogyny, prejudice, social and political anxiety (the Cold War was a trip y'all). No, it's SATANISM! It's heavy metal music! It's Dungeons & Dragons! That's what's wrong with the kids today. Satan is coming for your children! Patently absurd of course, but humans love themselves a witch hunt.  We can laugh about the rubes believing in Satanic cults coming for children but look around you. Nothing has changed. Are today's kids alright?  Probably not. But what I do know Jan is their problems aren't because your public library has Gender Queer on the shelf. 

Nobody is going to confuse this book with a piece of hard-hitting investigative journalism. Emerson slips in a few F-Bombs and there are portions where he simply cannot hide his sarcasm. If anything I found him restrained. The Jay's Journal portion of this book would have had me writing IN ALL CAPS WITH MUTLIPLE EXCLAMATION POINTS OMG!!!!!  But he does his homework. I have to imagine he gave Newspapers.com a serious workout, citing multiple newspaper stories that are truly mind-boggling, and it's obvious he talked to a fair number of people touched by Sparks' vile WTFery, and when he doesn't talk to them (usually folks associated with the publishing industry - color me not shocked) he states plainly that he didn't talk to them (usually in the form of "despite my numerous requests for an interview....").  

Which leads me to my last point. As a librarian currently in charge of overseeing a book budget, trying to keep physical shelves full and being price gorged into oblivion for eBooks and downloadable audiobooks, let's just say the publishing industry gets another black eye to add to their expanding collection, chasing a buck while not doing the literal bare minimum of fact-checking (seriously, a garden trowel would have uncovered most of her blatant lies) into Sparks' fabricated credentials. Which just goes to show that it's the same as it ever was. 

A rollercoaster of emotions, gripping and engrossing. Best book I've read so far this year.

Final Grade = A

Review: The Murder After The Night Before

The Murder After the Night Before by Katy Brent is a stand-alone suspense that blends chick-lit with dead bodies. I never could read a steady diet of chick lit, despite being the target demographic back in its heyday, but throw some dead bodies in there? I'm all in. This book was an experience, not always a good one, but an experience nonetheless.

The only way to describe this book is ugly. Molly Monroe is a 30-something journalist stuck in a dead end job writing for a tween girl magazine. She wakes up the morning after her office Christmas party to discover a strange man, fully clothed (and so is she...) in her bed. She's a hungover walking disaster hustling the guy out of her apartment, getting ready for work and making it to the office, naturally, late. And since she's such a hot mess she forgot to charge up her phone, so she hasn't seen any social media or retrieved any messages from last night. If she had, she at least would have been prepared. 

When she arrives at the office she learns the truth. She got rip-roaring black-out drunk at the office party then proceeded to barhop through London until she's livestreamed by an unknown person performing a sex act on a complete stranger outside a London bar. The social media response is predictable, and her boss sends her home for some time off, not being unsympathetic and offering to help her - in Molly's state it's entirely possible she was the victim of sexual assault. 

This would be bad enough for anyone to face. Molly is already spiraling when the hits just keep on coming. She returns home and finds her BFF and roommate, Posey, dead in the bathtub. Posey was the responsible one. The one who is a serious journalist, having just been promoted at work, who has her shit together, pays her bills on time etc. The cops arrive in short order and declare Posey's death an unfortunate accident, which doesn't track for Molly at all. I mean, it doesn't make sense. And since the cops aren't taking her seriously (I mean, duh) then it's up to Molly to snoop into Posey's life to try to find the truth. Which is no easy feat given Molly is still piecing together what happened the night before, but also turns out Posey was keeping plenty of secrets.

Despite immediately thinking of Molly as a hot mess, it was pretty obvious to me from the jump that Molly was "helped" along into her drunken state, likely with her drink(s) being tampered with. So she is a victim, but damn, she's still a hot mess. The first 30% of this book is just really unsavory and uncomfortable to read. Molly caught on a livestream giving a BJ to a stranger, social media behaving like social media, and very few people thinking there's anything wrong with tearing this woman to shreds. I stuck with it though and things really start to cook once Posey is found dead because then Molly is given a mission to discover the truth, against the insurmountable odds of nobody believing her because, well, see hot mess, live streamed sex act. 

The twists and turns then start to pile up and I was riveted. RIVETED I TELLS YA!  The author also explores grief in an honest way and has a lot to say about feminism and misogyny in general. Unsavory it may be, but it's an interesting stew all the same. 

But then, it happens. 

We get to the ending. Y'all I hate when an author doesn't stick the landing. There is some resolution to the story, especially in respect to what happened to Molly. We also find out who killed Posey. The problem with that? We just find out. We don't see that person being apprehended. There's no final showdown. We don't even find out what happens to the murderer. So we find out whodunit but we don't get the payoff. We don't get the justice. And y'all, bare minimum I need see the killer slapped in handcuffs or dead by the last sentence. While Molly ultimately pieces it together, the last chapter is literally a flashback scene to Posey's death. Shit, for all I know this bad person is still out there living their best life and now I just want to light everything on fire.

So what was hovering around a B- (seriously, the beginning is just really unpleasant and unsavory), ends up going down several notches, despite the middle portion when I couldn't tear myself away. I keep reading Brent because there's something about her voice and exploration of feminist themes that intrigue me, but I'm still waiting for her to hit all her beats and stick her landings.

Final Grade = C-

Review: Such a Perfect Family

It's pretty well documented at this point that I just don't do paranormals (Gothics notwithstanding). I'd never say paranormals are "stupid" or "terrible" nor would I question any reader who loves them or authors who write them.  Despite having read a few over the years, they're just not my bag. This is a longstanding thing for me - I was the girl growing up who couldn't be bothered with any story that had a whiff of fantasy in it. But Nancy Drew? Solving mysteries? All in. So my experience with Nalini Singh's work is entirely wrapped up in her suspense novels, and while she has stuck to one central theme in her entire suspense oeuvre thus far (more on that in a minute), she concocts the type of slow-burn character driven stories that tend to suck me in in record time. Such a Perfect Family was one heck of a ride.

Tavish Advani is son of a famous Hollywood actress, a borderline savant in the world of finance (he's made people a lot of money, including himself) and forty-three days ago he impulsively married Diya Prasad. Diya is a pampered, sheltered daughter of Indian doctors from New Zealand, on a bachelorette party trip to the States when she meets Tavish and it is love at first sight. Bingo-bango, quickie Las Vegas wedding and now Tavish has relocated to New Zealand to settle down into a new life with his wife and try to win over the disapproving in-laws. Even though they're already married, the official story is Tavish and Diya are "engaged" and plans are underway for a lavish Indian wedding ceremony. One morning Tavish heads to town to pick up wedding cake samples. When he returns he discovers the Prasad home engulfed in flames, Diya and her sister-in-law with multiple stab wounds, gravely injured, and his brother-in-law and Diya's parents nowhere to be found, presumably dead in the inferno. 

House fires happen, but two women found outside said home with multiple stab wounds, both now in comas at the local hospital are harder to explain. The cops are immediately on the scene and it doesn't take long for them to start sniffing around Tavish, despite the fact that he has (somewhat) of an alibi - he wasn't home at the time the fire erupted, albeit he could have set the whole thing in motion prior. Also, there's the teensy tiny issue that Tavish left Los Angeles with not one dead woman in his past - but three. All wealthy, older women and Tavish benefited from each and every one of their mysterious deaths. Despite his wife lying in the hospital, Tavish knows he's very close to being prime suspect #1, which means he's going to have to do his own investigating because his experience has taught him cops always look for the easiest explanation, even when it's wrong. And the more he digs into the lives of his in-laws? The more he realizes his wife's perfect family is anything but.

Singh takes her time setting up this story which opens up with a bang, Tavish returning to his in-laws home to find it ablaze. Then it's a series of shifting timelines as Singh peels back the layers on her (somewhat) unreliable narrator. Tavish's mother is a Movie Star (in capital letters) but any maternal instincts started and stopped with his oldest brother. Tavish was left with Mommy Dearest.  Hence his attraction to older women - even he recognizes it as hopelessly cliché. There's a cop in Los Angeles who is convinced Tavish is a serial killer and Tavish's father who has spent his life making up for his wife's shortcomings with their second child. But he's desperately in love with Diya and thinks it's all behind him, until it's not.  Seriously this guy doesn't go looking for trouble, it just seems to find him. 

While there's a cop in Los Angeles gunning for him, there's a cop in New Zealand who isn't quite so sure, and the whole thing ends up twisting and turning, spinning out to a conclusion that makes my soap opera loving heart sing. Singh may not be able to leave obsession alone as a theme in her suspense novels, but there's a good reason for that. Human beings are rather simple creatures and our motives for killing don't tend to be overly complex (greed, power, jealousy, rage etc.).  I'd argue it's only natural for Singh to keep exploring obsession in her novels, it's fascinating, there's a lot to unpack, and you can twist it around enough that it never feels like you're repeating yourself. And this one is a humdinger. Good Lord is this family screwed up. 

It all turns out somewhat right as rain in the end. I mean, our bad guy is caught but the family is decimated, and people are still dead. But it's a satisfying conclusion to a story that kept me riveted from the first to last page. I typically reserve A grades for things I'm desperate to find time to reread, and I'm not sure this one hits that threshold, but hot damn, it's a good 'un.

Final Grade = B+