Fiction – Page 3 – Carol's Notebook

The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict

March 23, 2021March 23, 2021 by Carol4 Comments

The Mystery of Mrs. Christie is historical fiction, imagining what may have happened when Agatha Christie "disappeared" in early December 1926. The facts are there, the car, the letters, the search, but around this Benedict wraps a fictional story of the Christies' first meeting through their married life. The majority of the book alternates between a manuscript Agatha wrote chronicling their lives together and the events around the disappearance, starting with the discovery of her empty car. The problem is no one is likable. Archie is a jerk. Agatha is too desperate to please him and right until the end too gutless to stand up for herself. I couldn't even really care about the daughter, Rosalind, who when she showed up in the tale, was too calm and pulled together. The grand reveal at the end wasn't really grand or much of a reveal. It did redeem the rest of the book a bit, making you look a little differently at...

The Christmas Train by David Baldacci

December 3, 2020December 10, 2020 by CarolNo Comments

The Christmas Train has just about everything: romance, adventure, mystery and holiday cheer. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's a great seasonal read, maybe a little cheesy in parts, but that's okay for a Christmas read. Our main character is Tom Langdon. Tom used to be a war correspondent but he had had enough of war. He now was doing fluff pieces but is still always on the move, going her and there to research stories. Tom has been dating a Hollywood voice over actress for about 3 years off and on in a long distance sort of relationship. So, it was almost Christmas and he needed to get from Washington D.C. to Los Angeles to spend the Holiday with his girlfriend. He wasn’t allowed to fly due to a slight “misunderstanding” with airport security. Tom was distantly related to Mark Twain and it was Tom’s father’s dying wish for Tom to write a piece about train travel, something Mark Twain had attempted...

Orlando by Virginia Woolf

January 27, 2020January 27, 2020 by Carol6 Comments

Orlando is a beautiful novel. The writing is smooth and descriptive. Orlando, man or woman, is charming and intelligent and introspective. He/she cares about literature and nature, love and (sometimes) people. It's rather plotless. Time passes, fashions change, but not much really happens. And the things that do, like Orlando becoming a woman rather than a man or living 300+ years, are treated as no bigger, no life-changing than day to day events. Orlando handles everything with grace and honesty. at heart, she is the same person he had always been. Reading Orlando in 2020 is not the same as reading when it was first published. When Orlando becomes a woman, she cannot inherit her own home. She can't be an Ambassador again. She feels she needs to be more aware of others see her. We forget that at the time women were just gaining the vote when this was published, and Woolf uses her book to show the...

Mailbox Monday

November 25, 2019January 6, 2020 by Carol12 Comments

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week. Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists. Tell us about your new arrivals by adding your Mailbox Monday post to the linky at mailboxmonday.wordpress.com. Left-Handed Death was first published in 1946. I've never read anything by Richard Hull, so am looking forward to it. My review of Christmas at the Chateau is scheduled for December 5....

Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay

July 23, 2019August 1, 2019 by Carol8 Comments

Some authors manage to pack more atmosphere and tension and characters into less than 200 pages than others ever manage to, even in books twice as long. Lindsay has done just that in Picnic at Hanging Rock. Girls at a boarding school go out for a picnic, as the title states, at Hanging Rock. Hanging Rock is a former volcano in central Victoria, Australia. The setting plays a huge part in the story, casts its shadow over the whole book. Hanging Rock After lunch, four of the girls go climbing in the rocks, followed eventually by one of the teachers. One of the girls runs back to the picnic area in terror, but with no memory of what happened. The rest of the girls and the teacher are never seen again. The rest of the story tells us what happens after. The ripples from the disappearances fan out, bringing terrible endings for some people and happily ever afters for others. There are a...

The Wolf and the Watchman by Niklas Natt och Dag

April 12, 2019April 12, 2019 by Carol6 Comments

Wow! The Wolf and the Watchman is the most engrossing novel I've read in a while. I want to tell you that you should read it and you should, but only if you like historical mysteries and don't mind some gruesomeness and brutality. It is not for everyone; it's dark and disturbing and if it was a movie I would have had to cover my eyes. It's also brilliant and I loved it. Stockholm in 1793 seems a terrible place to live unless you're rich. Crime, sickness, poverty, filth, corruption, rape, and death. Against this backdrop, two men with little to lose are on the hunt for a killer. Mikel Cardell, a former soldier with no family, no friends, one arm, and little money, pulls the mutilated body of a young dead man out of the lake. Cecil Winge, dying of consumption, takes the case in his position as consulting detective for the Stockholm police. Winge and Cardell are both interesting...