670. HAVOC by Christopher Bollen (5/10/25) Suspense
The setting is the Royal Karnak Palace Hotel in Luxor, Egypt where an eighty-one year old woman named Maggie is residing during the pandemic. Maggie, a compulsive meddler sees that a young boy named Otto and his mother, Tess are residing in the hotel. The oppressive heat contributes to the guests’ mounting tension. Maggie finds that in meddling in Tess and Otto’s affairs she might have found her match in that eight-year-old Otto also likes to engage in a battle of wits and manipulation. Each try to deceive the other as we watch how far they are willing to go in the game of cat and mouse. It becomes a battle of who can create the most havoc for the other. What is going on in each other’s heads is the psychological factor bringing the suspense.
Clever writing and plot twists make this a fun, exciting read.
4 Stars
669. HIDDEN PICTURES by Jason Kekulak (5/5/25) Thriller
Mallory Quinn, a recovering addict takes a job as a nanny and finds 5 year old Teddy’s drawings troubling. They seem to be hiding details of a past murder within the pictures. Mallory feels he is too young to have drawn the detailed image of a man dragging a woman’s body. She suspects that the drawings are not his work but from something communicated to him supernaturally. Mallory’s addiction problem started on her way to becoming a world-class runner and she is worried that this disturbing situation could bring on a relapse. But she can’t deny what she sees and she gets help figuring out what is going on with the gardener next door.
This story is creepy, with the lines that blur between reality and the supernatural that are chilling. The ending has an unexpected plot twist and I find Kekulak to be top drawer at writing thrillers.
4 Stars
661. AUDITION by Katie Kitamura (4/15/25)
An elegant middle aged woman is lunching with Xavier, a handsome younger man. She senses the waitstaff and patrons are stealing glances at the couple and are wondering if they are on a date even though they have a big age difference. She believes they would be surprised to learn that the young man in the restaurant believes he might be her son whom he read she had given up.
The woman, unnamed, is an actress married to a writer, Tomas, who are both dignified, artsy, successful intellectuals. She tells the young man that he couldn’t be her son because the pregnancy ended in abortion and another in a miscarriage.
In Part II, the author, using the same characters and settings, makes Xavier their son with the couple opening up their home for him to stay. The author changes the story at will with the woman now a doting mother, then she can’t remember details of him growing up. He was supposed to stay temporarily, then brings in a girlfriend and Tomas becomes a butler to their needs. In the end the apartment is trashed, the characters are at odds, and there are no clues to what is happening.
I am trying to figure this story out which doesn’t make much sense. The title may give a clue to how to do different scenarios to the same characters and how they react and how other’s judge them. Beyond that I don’t know what the f**k this book means.
3 Stars
660. WE USED TO LIVE HERE by Marcus Kliever (4/12/25) Suspense
This book is about squatters who come into your house and won’t leave. It is a bigger problem because the owners are living in the house. When house flippers Charlie and Eve buy a great home for an incredible price they are astonished with their good luck and start the remodeling immediately.
When the doorbell rings they find a family standing there telling them they were former owners of the house many years ago and would it be okay if they could show the house to their children. Charlie is reluctant but Eve lets them in and they spend way too much time wandering around and have outstayed there welcome. Then their son goes missing and they can’t leave till he is found. After many reasons why they can’t leave it begins to feel weird and creepy.
This situation is realistic enough to make the reader uncomfortable and anxious. The scarier it got, the more I had to read. This was truly haunting and almost too realistic.
4 Stars
649. THE MIDNIGHT FEAST by Lucy Foley (3/12/25) Suspense
The Midnight Feast is the gala party given by the owner of the restored Manor. As guests arrive at the Manor they are excited yhsy hiswill be the event of the decade. The drinks, food and CBD oil is flowing and many of the old friends from the past are having a blast.
The next morning the police are called when a body has been found. the guests are ordered to stay at the Manor while they investigate. The guests also uncover who has enemies within.
Out of all of Lucy Foley’s books , this one was the most difficult to stay with. The suspense was flat until the end, the characters unlikable, and the story contrived. What I like the most about the book is the title and the book cover! They sell books,
3 Stars
647. THE LIFE WE BURY by Allen Eskens (3/5/25) Mystery
Young college student, Joe Talbert, has a writing assignment for his English class. He is to interveiw a stranger and write a brief biography of that person. At a nearby nursing home he finds a willing subject, Carl Iverson, a dying Vietnam veteran and convicted murderer. With only a few months to live he is medically paroled, after spending thirty years in prison for rape and murder.
As Joe writes about Carl’s heroic acts as a soldier he finds it hard to reconcile the war hero with the dispicible acts of the convict.
With mounting problems in his own life affecting him, Joe, who is trying to unravel Carl’s complicated conviction to find the truth, worries that the time will run out for Carl.
Time limits always bring added tension to a story and Eskens uses this tool well to stir the pot.
4 Stars
642. THE CRASH by Frieda McFadden (2/21/25) Suspense
I usually like McFadden who keeps the reader scared and guessing through to the end. This story involves a twenty-two year old girl/woman named Tegan who is pregnant, has little money, and makes very bad decisions. Example: When she asks her brother to take her in until the baby is born, she leaves for his house late in the day in a snowstorm, loses control of her car which she crashes into a tree, breaks her ankle, and she has no internet. Luckily, Hank, a stranger sees the crash and takes her to his house where his wife Polly, a nurse, says she will help with the delivery.
When there are flawed characters, especially the protagonist like Tegan, we should have some things good about her so we can build empathy for her poor judgment. There was not much of that in this story. The plot did have twists and turns to keep one going.
3 Stars
637. BEAUTIFUL UGLY by Alice Feeney (2/7/25) Thriller
Grady Green, an author, finds his wife’s car by a cliff edge, lights on, driver door open, phone still there, but his wife Abby is nowhere in sight.
A year later, still overcome with grief, he can’t write, or sleep. He travels to a tiny Scottish island to regroup. He spots a woman who looks exactly like his wife. The suspense mounts.
The dark, Scottish skies set a creeping sense of expectation and the events that follow build on the story’s unsettling pace of this mystery which turns everything you expect upside down.
4 Stars
636. THE GREY WOLF by Louise Penny (2/1/25) Mystery
This is another (#19) in the Chief Inspector Gamache series. Maybe Penny has run this series into the ground, as I found this plot dull and weak–the characters seem like friends that act like enemies or were worn out and vanilla. She also used a new narrator that I found boring. In fact, I have to admit that I finished it, but it was hard. But it did put this series to bed.
2 Stars
620. THE WAITING by Michael Connelly (1/3/25) Mystery
LAPD Detective Renee Ballard is tracking a serial rapist, but the case is going cold. She sees that Harry Bosch’s daughter, Patrol Officer Maddie, is a new volunteer with the Open-Unsolved Unit. With a cast of three, we who love audiobooks are treated to the best in another great book by Connelly. It opens with a scene on the ocean involving a female surfer, Ballard, and a man trying to impress her, an expert surfer, with his skills. Just listening to Connelly’s characters in the waves brings the first chills in a series of scary, suspenseful moments.
This is the last of the six Ballard-Bosch books and again he seems to hit another home run. By the way, while Ballard was surfing someone stole her phone, gun, wallet, and LAPD badge from her car, which lead to Ballard calling Harry Bosch to help her find the culprit.
4 Stars
619. HERE ONE MOMENT by Liane Moriarty (12/27/24) Suspense
Passengers on a flight become frightened when a mysterious woman named Cherry, or “the Death Lady’, tells passengers the exact time of their deaths. They grapple with the knowledge of their destinies as they decode how to live knowing when they will die.
We learn about the lives of each of the passengers, many of their problems, health decisions, and their love lives. Each react differently to this knowledge. Despite the darkness of these predictions, the book stays positive in the affect on the passengers and how knowing can give them hope.
This is a different concept than Moriarty usually contrives and I found it unique.
4 Stars
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