Little Syllables: The Blog
Review - The Caretaker by Ron Rash
I received a review copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Ron Rash’s latest work of fiction, The Caretaker, is a character-driven tale of love and loss. The story follows Jacob, his wife Naomi, and his best friend Blackburn (the titular caretaker). Jacob has been conscripted into the army during the Korean War, leaving behind a pregnant Naomi, who is shunned by his parents. Jacob asks his best friend Blackburn to take care of her while he’s gone.
Blackburn does his best for Naomi, to protect her from Jacob’s parents, and to shield her from the judgmental community. But after an accident, she returns to her father’s house in another state. Soon Jacob’s parents see an opportunity to be rid of her—and get their son back. Blackburn proves key in the aftermath, driven both by his desire to create a happy life for himself and by his loyalty to his friends.
This book has beautiful description, complex characters, and an intriguing plot. I was swept up in the world of 1951 Blowing Rock, North Carolina. Rash immerses the reader in the beauty of a cemetery, the pain of loving and losing, and the redemptive power of love.
I absolutely loved this book and highly recommend it! The Caretaker is available now.
Review - The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger
As I read William Kent Krueger’s newest book, The River We Remember, I found myself getting lost in his descriptions of time and place. I felt transported. If nothing else, Krueger’s work feels like a love story to a beautiful river in rural Minnesota.
The River We Remember tells the story of James Quinn’s death and its aftermath in the small town of Jewel. Sheriff Dern and his deputies are called in to investigate the death of Quinn—an important, but hated man, and they are forced to make choices about the true meaning of justice. The story not only follows Dern’s investigation, but also the intertwining lives of the citizens of Jewel—the sheriff’s family; the local newspaperman; the owner of the local diner; teenagers Scott and Del; Quinn’s wife and children; and the enigmatic Noah and Kyoko Bluestone.
The book is a beautifully written portrait of a quaint but wounded hometown where no one is left untouched by the tragedies of their neighbors.
Because in a town this small, everyone is connected.
This book touches on a lot of important themes, like racial prejudice in the aftermath of World War II, the personal impact of war, the appropriation of indigenous lands, and the choices good people are forced to make in impossible circumstances. Krueger makes his characters very human. Nobody here is flawless.
Sensitive readers should know this book contains references to suicide, sexual assault, child abuse, drug use, and racism.
The River We Remember is available now!
Review - Whalefall by Daniel Kraus
I received a free review copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
It had been a while since I’d read a good science fiction survival story, so I was excited to get a review copy of Daniel Kraus’s new book Whalefall. This book is reminiscent of The Martian in that it’s about a man on his own in a fight for his life. But it’s so much more than that, too. It is also a look at a young man’s fraught relationship with his recently deceased father and the process of grieving.
Jay was raised on the water. His father Mitt taught him about the ocean and scuba diving. The two had a very rocky relationship, culminating with Jay leaving home to live with a friend in his teens. Now Mitt is gone, and Jay is grappling with the loss and his family’s feeling that he abandoned his father at the end of his life. So Jay sets out to redeem himself—by scuba diving in Monterey Bay to search for Mitt’s remains.
As Jay confronts the ocean, the dive, and the search for his father’s remains, his thoughts return to memories of times he had with his father.
But the already dangerous dive takes a turn when Jay gets caught up in a confrontation between a giant squid and a sperm whale. In the aftermath, Jay is caught in the squid tentacles and dragged into the whale’s mouth.
The rest of the story follows Jay as he tries to find a way out of the whale, all while he grapples with losing his father and comes to terms with their relationship. It’s raw and visceral (sometimes literally) as he does whatever he can to escape the whale before his air runs out.
I love how, even though this seems like a completely implausible situation, the author makes it feel very real. And while creating this narrative filled with rich detail about the ocean, scuba diving, and the sperm whale, Kraus also manages to create complex characters and intricate relationships within Jay’s family.
I highly recommend this book! I read it in two days, and I was engrossed from beginning to end. Whalefall is out now!
Review - The Way of the Fearless Writer by Beth Kempton
I received an advanced copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Beth Kempton’s The Way of the Fearless Writer weaves together her knowledge of Japanese language and culture with the process of writing. She offers a mindful approach to writing that is based on Buddhism.
This book was inspiring.
I have been an aspiring writer all my life, but I am often held back by fear of what others will think of me and my writing. So I don’t share. This is exactly the problem that Kempton addresses in this book. She offers guidance for a fearful writer to embrace the process of creativity and to know when it’s time to share the writing.
I found this book and its author to be insightful, wise, and realistic. She provides writing prompts throughout and I found myself highlighting prompts that I wanted to come back to. This would be an excellent book to read slowly and work through the exercises as they are introduced. But it is also an excellent book to read straight through.
I especially appreciated how the author shares her own creative process. I think that writers often don’t know what the initial process looks like for others. Classes and workshops teach the end of the process, the refining, the editing, and the polishing. But Kempton spends a good portion of this book discussing how to get started, how to piece together a larger work, and how to be patient as the ideas form.
I heartily recommend this book for any writer, but especially for a writer looking to be more mindful and less fearful.
The Way of the Fearless Writer is now available.
Review - Everything All At Once by Steph Catudal
I received a free advanced copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
I specifically sought out an advanced copy of Steph Catudal’s new memoir, Everything All At Once. Ever since I started using iFit on my treadmill, I’ve been a fan of Tommy Rivs, so I began following him on Instagram. Then I started seeing his wife’s writing when he’d share it, so I started following her as well. Now, she’s written a book about her life and her experience through her husband’s cancer diagnosis and treatment.
This book is heavy, but it is very well written. Catudal’s writing is beautiful and lyrical and honest and very emotional. She tells of her father’s terminal cancer diagnosis and his death when she was still very young. She details how that trauma, combined with her religious upbringing, led her into a pretty intense rebellion. I liked reading Steph’s descriptions of what it was like to deconstruct from her religious (Mormon) upbringing because I could connect with that on a personal level.
Steph intertwines this history with the more recent past, detailing Rivs’s diagnosis and hospitalization in 2020. This intertwining of timelines works very well in this book, and eventually the timelines meet as we near the present. These dual timelines also help the reader see Steph’s arc from rebellious and headstrong teenager to loving and devoted wife and mother. And where the story of her past involves her loss of faith, the story of the more recent past involves her rebuilding of a new kind of faith.
One unusual thing about this book is its structure. While Rivs was in the hospital, Steph took to social media to share her thoughts. The final portion of this book is made up of those social media posts, most of which has been described earlier in the book. I thought this was an interesting choice to place these together at the end instead of interspersed throughout the narrative. But I still think it works.
I’ll admit, I was emotionally invested in this story before I even got my hands on a copy. I had already heard the story from Rivs on iFit, but it was incredible to read Steph’s perspective as well. I read it in a single day, and I cried. I highly recommend it for those who enjoy memoir and who are not averse to reading about intense medical treatment and the emotional impact on the patient’s family.
Sensitive readers should be aware that this book contains adult language, drug and alcohol use, sex, and terminal illness and hospitalization. It’s heavy, but in my opinion, it’s worth it.
Review - No Two Persons by Erica Bauermeister
I received a free review copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Summing It Up
First off—take a gander at that cover art! I’m in love.
Erica Bauermeister’s new book No Two Persons is unlike anything I have ever read before. I was swept up in the story of this book within a book. Instead of a traditional protagonist, this contemporary tale follows a book from person to person as it influences lives, eventually coming back to where it started.
Each chapter is named for one of ten people who encounter the book Theo: The Writer, The Bookseller, The Actor, The Artist, The Caretaker, etc. Each of these people is influenced in some way by this book—whether they read it or not. Some of them are inspired. Some of them are comforted. All of them are affected.
I Loved
I loved this book and the way it shows how literature affects people in different ways. It begs questions like, What does it mean for someone to pass on a book to someone else? What can a work of fiction really tell us about ourselves? How can a reader further inspire a writer?
The characters Bauermeister has created are varied and intricate. The stories of The Teenager and The Caretaker are the two that have stuck with me the most as I’ve considered this book. Not every story is resolved on the pages of the book. We don’t see every step of the book’s journey. We don’t see every connection between characters. But each character’s story adds something to the whole and shows us how our lives are all interconnected in many ways.
I found it interesting that Bauermeister even considered those people who have a book and choose not to read it. It can still affect them. It can still influence them.
Read It
No Two Persons was released today (May 2, 2023)! I highly recommend it.
Review - See It End by Brianna Labuskes
I received a free galley of this book from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Summing It Up
See It End is Brianna Labuskes’ latest thriller and the third installment in her “Dr. Gretchen White” series.
This book begins with a confession by detective Lauren Marconi and a plea that Gretchen not investigate the murder. Of course Gretchen can’t resist. She teams up with Assistant DA Lochlan Gibbs, determined to prove her friend’s innocence and find out the truth.
This murder mystery is entwined with the larger mystery of what happened to a series of kidnapped boys. Marconi is convinced the boys’ cases are connected, plus she has a personal reason for seeking justice for the boys. Her search ultimately leads to her arrest while Gretchen and Gibbs work feverishly to free her.
Although it’s the third book in a series, it works well as a stand-alone novel. Labuskes didn’t give me the whole backstory, but there was enough explanation of the earlier books without it feeling overwhelming. And I had enough information to understand the characters and their relationships.
I Loved
This book has both great characters and a great mystery. I especially loved the main character, Gretchen, who embraces and works with her personal flaws. Gibbs works as a perfect foil for her character, and I loved how they played off each other throughout the book.
This book kept me guessing until the end, which is just what I like in a thriller! I suspected five or six different characters throughout the book, and I was very satisfied by how it all wrapped up at the end.
Content Advisory
Sensitive readers should be aware that this book contains mentions of child abuse, kidnapping, murder, and pedophilia.
Read It
See It End by Brianna Labuskes will be available April 18, 2023!
Review - You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith
I received a free review copy of this book through NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Summing It Up
Poet Maggie Smith’s memoir, You Could Make This Place Beautiful, is an emotional and powerful look at marriage, divorce, and parenting. She tries to make sense of her life using what she knows best: writing craft. She looks at her life story as a plot, even while urging readers not to do the same. She examines the story structure of her life. She even envisions it as a stage play.
All these devices help the reader see more deeply into the author’s struggle to reconcile her expectations versus her reality, to make sense of the major changes that come with the ending of a marriage and the beginning of something new.
While this book is not a straightforward narrative, it leads readers from one point to the next in an artful way. Rather than a story, it is a series of essays pieced together like fragmented thoughts. And just like the author, the reader is left with questions. That is the point, after all – we never get all the answers to life’s biggest questions. I especially appreciated the author’s conclusion that she could move on despite uncertainty.
I was intrigued by her efforts to write her own truth while protecting those she wrote about. She never names her ex-husband. She discusses her children, but explicitly tells readers when she won’t be showing certain parts of their lives. I have never read a memoir that dealt with hard issues while maintaining this level of privacy before. But it works and it feels even more personal as the author tells us what she’s not going to tell us.
Even as this is a book about the author’s own divorce, the effort she makes to see her own responsibility is obvious. It doesn’t feel like she’s blaming or vindictive. I felt that her description of what it is to be a wife is very apt. She was a woman who loved someone and worked and sacrificed to try to make it work. Then, she was left a single parent, working to provide for herself and her children, while learning to embrace her own power.
I loved it. I already plan to read it again.
Read It
You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith is set for release on April 11, 2023.
Review - Maame by Jessica George
I received a free advanced copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Maame by Jessica George tells the story of Maddie, a mid-20s office worker who has always taken care of others at the expense of herself. She comes from an unconventional family—a mother who was often absent, a father who was often reticent, and a brother who left as soon as he could. Now Maddie is left in the care of her ailing father while her mother spends most of her time in Ghana and her brother works an unpredictable job. Then her mother returns, freeing Maddie to move out and start to live her own life.
Maddie is sheltered and awkward, inexperienced and isolated. And as she determines to try new things, she makes a lot of mistakes. The important thing is that she learns from these mistakes and continues moving forward. When tragedy strikes, Maddie is left to re-evaluate her role in her family and in her own life.
I felt the main theme of this book is the search for identity. I especially appreciated Maddie’s realization that the identity she has been living in may not be what she would have chosen. Maddie has to come to terms with her life as a Black woman, an aspiring professional, a sexual being, a friend, and a daughter. As frustrating and hopeless as her life feels at times, the reader is ultimately left with a sense of hope for Maddie’s future.
Maame is a book that touched me in several ways and helped me see the empowerment that comes from reclaiming the self. I highly recommend this one!
Maame is set for release on January 31, 2023.
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Review - Secret Lives by Mark de Castrique
I received a free advanced copy from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Secret Lives by Mark de Castrique is an awesome thriller that kept me guessing until the end. The book is firmly grounded and very believable, with complex characters and an intricate plot.
The thing I liked most about this book was the characters—especially Edith. I love a strong female lead, and Edith was surprising and very human. Edith is an elderly landlady, a former FBI agent, and our clever detective. She carries this story from start to finish.
An unexpected benefit of reading this book was that I learned a fair bit about cryptocurrency. The story follows a group of FBI and Secret Service agents through a murder investigation, which is mixed up with a financial fraud case. Cryptocurrency is a big feature here, including how to exchange it, how to access it, and how to protect it. Whether or not the details provided in the book are accurate (which is beyond me), it felt believable and real to me.
Secret Lives is an awesome thriller that kept me guessing.
Ultimately, I gave this book 5 stars. It is excellently written, the characters are complex, and the mystery is a wild ride.
To keep the mystery going, the author casts suspicion on several different characters. There were several moments in the book when I thought I’d figured it out, but I kept guessing until the climax, when the true villain is unveiled.
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