This is a pure literary look at small town America and unashamedly so. Alice Hoffman’s writing style is pure and beautiful and it’s hard not to be blow away by the display of talent found in her novel The Red Garden. It is set in the world of the people of Blackwell in Massachusetts. And it’s a novel about people. It is the characters you will fall in love with and remember when all else fades. At the heart of the town is the mysterious garden where only plants that are red in color can grow …
Fiction
Maid of Baikal: A Novel Of The Russian Civil War
This must be the most interesting alternative history that I’ve ever read. It asks the utterly bizarre question; “What if a Siberian Joan of Arc had rescued the White Armies at a critical point of the Russian Civil War in 1919?” And it turns out that the answer is a lot more entertaining than you could have reasonably expected. Zhanna Dorokhina is 18 as the civil war rages around her. She’s smart, capable and virtuous. There are voices in her head, and they are starting to indicate that …
Bird Box
The Netflix movie version of the book has been one of the year’s more controversial movies. It’s been simultaneously hailed as ground-breaking and as not very good by different groups of critics. I don’t have an opinion on the film either way – I prefer to read and it’s fair to say that Josh Malerman’s Bird Box is a suspenseful, compelling novel that you’re going to want to see through to the end. The premise is a peculiar one. There is something out there. Something that if you catch …
The Strivers’ Row Spy (The Renaissance Series)
We don’t cover a lot of spy stories on Mom Reads and this is definitely the first set in The Roaring Twenties. It’s an unusual enough setting that Jason Overstreet really brings to life in the first book of The Renaissance Series – The Strivers’ Row Spy. It’s worth noting that this isn’t a mystery novel, so if that’s a deal breaker – look elsewhere. Sidney Temple finds his wonder years interrupted as he’s tapped up to join the FBI as one of the service’s first African-American agents. He …
Drifters Alliance
Elle Casey is our freebie of the day big-hitter this week. She’s a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author and the first book in the Drifter’s Alliance Series, Drifter’s Alliance is up for grabs for a short period of time. This is a fine space opera, though a lot shorter than that genre normally allows for at 250 pages of text. Cass Kennedy is the heroine of the piece and she’s just got her own ship. She’s invested heavily in training and feels ready to take on the universe. Then she …
Cut And Run
Mary Burton is going to be a star. She’s already one of the elite group of writers who can claim to be a New York Times bestselling author and the sky’s really the limit. There may be no better master of suspense around today. Her novels not only keep me on the edge of my seat; they leave me wondering if I will ever sleep again sometimes. Cut and Run is no exception and this story of twins who were separated as children but are reunited by horrific crimes is unputdownable. Faith McIntyre is a …
Aunt Dimity’s Death (Aunt Dimity Mystery)
This is the first book of a 22 book series with a 23rd in the pipeline, so don’t expect to have an easy time of things if you fall in love with Aunt Dimity’s way of dealing with mysteries. Many nights of rollicking tales await the lucky reader. We start with Lori Shepherd who thought that Aunt Dimity was nothing but a myth. Then she learns in a reading of the lady’s will that she was very real, indeed. However, if Lori wants the cash that she’s been left – she needs to solve the last mystery …
Dead Weight
The intro to the Amazon page says $5.99 for a limited time! But for the moment, that’s wrong and the book is available free of charge for a promotional period. Dead Weight is an unusual novel for a freebie. Why? Well, because it’s not the first, the second or third part of a series but rather a stand-alone book. It’s also a very good one. Zephyr Rockwell has gone camping. When he awakes after a night under the stars – the world has changed forever. Almost everyone has disappeared, and modern …
Fahrenheit 451
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury is considered to be one of the all-time science-fiction classics. It was written in the middle of the 20th century but unlike many of its contemporaries; it’s not feeling its age. It takes very little time to realize that there are parallels with the modern era here and that the world it describes is much closer to ours than might be comfortable for you. The “hero” of the tale is Guy Montag. He’s a fireman. That’s not the kind of fireman who rescues cats from …