Book Notices | Aunt Dimity's Death by Nancy Atherton / Suspicion by Joseph Finder / Insurgent by Veronica Roth

Nancy Atherton, Aunt Dimity's Death

Amazon   So I stumbled on this charming cozy from the early 90's. Nancy Atherton's Aunt Dimity's Death is the first in a series that is apparently still going strong. The 19th Aunt Dimity book, Aunt Dimity and the Wishing Well, was just released about a month ago. With the arrival of a letter Lori Shepherd, who's temping to barely make ends meet when the book begins, soon finds herself whisked into, well, lots of stuff: a world of privilege, romance, mystery, and the supernatural. Her transition from struggling American divorcée to refined, tea-serving American expat in England seems a little abrupt, as do some of the revelations (romantic and supernatural) that come along. But all in all I liked it. I'm not sure that I'd read all nineteen novels, but I wouldn't rule out another one.

Joseph Finder, Suspicion

Amazon   Joseph Finder's stand-alone thriller Suspicon is simply a great read. Finder starts backing his everyman protagonist into a corner pretty much from page one, and the tension never lets up. When the book opens, widowed father Danny Goodman is trying to figure out how, given his depleted finances, he can send his daughter on a school trip to Italy. The answer presents itself pretty quickly, a stroke of fortune in the person of the father of his daughter's new friend, but accepting money from the guy turns out to have dire consequences....

Veronica Roth, Insurgent

Amazon   The Divergent series is huge deal with tweens at the moment, and my own tween has required that I jump on the bandwagon. I like that we're reading buddies, so I jump when told. The book's not bad, but I have trouble keeping the various secondary characters straight, which suggests that I'm not paying as close attention as I should. It's very difficult to accept that the society Roth has created could actually exist, but there are hints--maybe something stronger than hints--that it didn't spring up organically. I'll be able to accept the story better if it turns out they're all living in a big social experiment.