Category Archives: Novels

10.04.16
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MILLER’S VALLEY/ ANNA QUINDLEN

” But no one ever leaves the town where they grew up, not really, even if they go.”  In those key strokes Anna Quindlen, through the voice of  Mimi, Miller’s Valley protagonist, speaks for everyone who hails from small town rural America.

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Miller’s Valley reads with an easy cadence.  ” Oh, I get that, I know him he’s just like… she reminds me of…. ” I said to myself over and over, as Miller’s Valley unfolded  on pages that turned easily and eagerly.

In every small town there exists a mystery behind every doorway and in Miller’s Valley the secrets play out at kitchen tables, barns and where else but at the local diner. The book reads like a memoir. It is both predictable and unpredictable in a perfect blend.

Anna Quindlen was a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist while at the New York Times. Her memoir Lots of Candles Plenty of Cake published in 2012 was a  number one New York Times bestseller.

Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

05.10.16
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THE NIGHTINGALE/KRISTIN HANNAH

There is little wonder why The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah has received acclaim.  The  novel  is a great read, indeed a page turner, reminding me of Doerr’s All The Light We Can Not See.

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The Nightingale translates the horror of German occupied France during WW II.  It is a hero’s worship of the French Resistance, of brave women and men fighting their occupiers against all odds. There are victories,  losses, triumphs and tragedies but throughout the pages evolves a love story, and a reconciliation between sisters, a father and daughter.  The war brings people together and simultaneously tears them apart. A tale of survival, brilliant  storytelling, riveting to the end.

As is my want  on this blog I will give no more detail about this story other  than to encourage you to enjoy.  The Nightingale is very much  another of  Gordon’s Good Reads.

A selection of additional books by Kristin Hannah include Fly Away, The Things We Do For Love, Once in Every Life, and A Handful of Heaven.

03.26.16
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ROGUE LAWYER/PURE ENJOYMENT/CONTEMPORARY ISSUES

It took only three sittings to race through John Grisham’s latest novel Rogue Lawyer.  I wasn’t in a particular rush but like so much of his work it was hard to put down. I especially liked Rogue Lawyer because it added a few edgy contemporary issues.

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” A lawyer like me is forced to work in the shadows. My opponents are protected by badges, uniforms, and all the myriad trappings of government power. They are a sworn and duty-bound to uphold the law, but since they cheat like hell it forces me to cheat even more.”

The story of the middle of the night police invasion of a private home is frightening and carries a familiar ring of cable news.   Your mind may chill with images of  surplus Army tanks, Kevlar and night vision goggles on the streets of local communities. The book has a menu other cases, characters and  clients.

John Grisham’s Rogue Lawyer is indeed a good read. For other great Grisham novels search gordonsgoodreads.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

01.27.16
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THE JAPANESE LOVER/ ISABEL ALLENDE/ COMPLEX SOCIAL THEMES

Isabel Allende captures a complex variety of societal topics in her new novel The Japanese Lover. Allende weaves desperate themes in a story line encompassing aging, a burning love affair which transcends racial lines, the Japanese internment during WWII, human trafficking, child pornography and homosexuality.

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Allende hardly misses a social issue while telling a story surrounding the life of a well to do San Francisco woman from a prominent Jewish family who beginning in her childhood falls in love with a Japanese boy, the son of the gardener at their seaside estate. The story continues over hills and valleys Till death do us part.

It is always pleasurable to read Allende’s writing. Her novels touch reality  and the characters provoke thought and deliver insight but absent a lecture.  I also commend to you Allende’s Island Beneath The Sea and Daughter of Fortune. Search here at gordonsgoodreads for further details on these novels.

01.12.16
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COMMANDER IN CHIEF- HOOKED ON TOM CLANCY NOVELS

It is another must read for all lovers of Tom Clancy Jack Ryan Novels.  Again, Mark Greaney carries on the great tradition.  Commander In Chief turns the Russo/American conflict from The Ukraine to Lithuania with a thinly disguised Russian President Valeri Volodin raising havoc in the Baltic’s.

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Jack Ryan Jr. returns in this novel with a large role and John Clark again proves he is invincible!  Add to the plot money laundering, Bitcoin and a new class of Russian submarines and Greaney has all the necessary ingredients for 718 pages of excitement.

No spoilers here!  Just get the book and anticipate a good read.

 

12.14.15
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Snow Falling On Cedars/A Timely Classic from 1994

The prose is magnificent and the story ironically timely in these divisive days of 2015.  Twenty-one-years after its original publication in 1994 the story line is as prescient as then. Snow Falling On Cedars by David Guterson is an award-winning novel, the themes of which resonate today.

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The writing captivates the reader from the very first pages. Outside the wind blew steadily from the north, driving snow against the courthouse. By noon three inches had settled on the town, a snow so ethereal it could hardly be said to have settled at all, instead it swirled like some icy fog.

As the story unfolds, a young Japanese man is accused of murder surrounded by the prejudice against all Japanese following the Second World War. A love affair between a young newspaperman and a Japanese woman, a trial, a community split apart and a  verdict.

Prescient?  Look into my face, interrupted Hatsue. Look at my eyes Ishmael. My face is the face of the people who did it–don’t you see what I mean? My face, it’s how the Japanese look. My family is in bad trouble now. Do you see what I mean?

No further spoiling of the story. It would be a travesty for me to do so. You will thank me for telling  you of my belated discovery of  Snow Falling On Cedars.  The novel was made into a movie directed by John Hicks and released in 1995.

 

 

11.19.15
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THE LIGHT BETWEEN OCEANS/AN ABSOLUTE GEM!

A love that kindles the depths of the heart is interwoven with an unimaginable self-inflicted tragedy in M.L. Stedman’s novel The Light Between Oceans.  “When it comes to kids, parents are all instinct and hope.”  The Light Between Oceans is everything that this reader believes a good novel should be.

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The tale is told with extraordinary care with just enough complexity to always nudge reality.  Stedman’s characters are believable, true to themselves and captivating story tellers. ” You have to forgive only once. To resent one must do it all day every day.”   The skies over Janus are clear as its beacon keeps mariners safe, but even the brightest light is not a shield from life’s stormy seas. As The New York Times stated in its initial review, “Prepare to weep.”

First published in 2012 The Light Between Oceans is more than a good read. It is marvelous! M.L. Stedman was born and raised in  Western Australia, the setting of this book.  She now lives in London. This is her first novel. More please!

07.09.15
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WINTER IN MADRID/ A DIFFERENT C.J. SANSOM

C.J. Sansom’s Winter in Madrid is a wonderful departure from his excellent Shardlake Series.  Dissolution, Dark Fire, Sovereign, Revelation,and Heart-stone are all  Sansom novels set in sixteenth century England. ( See my overviews of the aforementioned here at gordonsgoodreads.com).

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Winter in Madrid is a novel set in 1940, just after the Spanish Civil War. It is a story of love, friendship and high adventure surrounding the rescue of a young veteran who left England after the evacuation of Dunkirk to join in the fight against the Fascists in Spain. English prep school friends find themselves together on Spanish soil some seeking their fortune, others justice and lost love.

Sansom delivers a bonus history of post Civil War Spain enveloped in an intriguing story that moves with a fine pace and bountiful energy. His writing is never flowery but captures the moment perfectly with a judicious vocabulary.  One exception is ” coffee.”  You will see what I mean as you devour this good read.

Samson’s latest in the Shardlake Series is Lamentation, which is next on my Sansom list. I will post upon completion.

Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

06.09.15
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GRISHAM BACK TO BACK-NOT EVEN SUMMER YET!

Now I am up to date on John Grisham and have met his new heroine. I like Samantha and I hope we hear more from her.  With Grisham it only takes a paragraph and you get the picture.

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” I got nothing, he said between breaths as Mavis wiped tears and rattled away.  Just like that he’s outta work,  Mavis said.  No paycheck, no black lung benefits, no prospect of finding any kind of work.  All he’s ever done is work in the coalfields. What’s he supposed to do now?  You gotta help us Samantha. You gotta do something. This ain’t right.”

” Keely, the thirteen- year- old eased into the chair. She managed a gap toothed smile, more fitting for a ten-year-old. My Daddy liked you a lot, she said. Will you hold my hand? she asked. My Daddy said you were the only lawyer brave enough to fight the coal companies. You’re gonna stay and help us, aren’t you miss Sam?

It gets better and better with the turn of each page.

Gray Mountain begs for a sequel.

 

03.03.15
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FULL FORCE AND EFFECT—-JACK RYAN RETURNS

President Jack Ryan is back  in Mark Greaney’s  new novel Tom Clancy Full Force and Effect.  Greaney hits his stride in his second book in the Clancy legacy following Tom Clancy’s death in October, 2013. His first was Tom Clancy Support and Defend. ( Search  here at Gordon’s Good Reads.)

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Tom Clancy fans, myself included, will not be disappointed as familiar characters return in the page turning action to which readers have become accustomed in Greaney’s writing.  Few, if any, wasted paragraphs.

The timely plot is of course North Korea. The new Supreme Leader Choi-Ji-hoon is more malevolent and even less stable than his deceased father. Driven to build a nuclear ICBM delivery system, Choi-Ji-hoon drives his subservient ghouls into a fiendish plot to source the   cash to fund the project, through the discovery of valuable heavy metals in the mountains of the north.

Profiteers join with America’s natural enemies in an unholy alliance with the North Koreans to carry out the complicated task of mining, marketing and converting into cash this new exploitable resource.

Enter ” The Campus” and  POTUS in an alliance to stop the madness. Mark Greaney’s research and storytelling  approach cable news reality!  Tom Clancy fans will enjoy every page, satisfied that there will be still more of this great series.

Enjoy!