Fake

I chose this 2022 novel by Erica Katz for the Calendar of Crime Reading Challenge based on the month of publication. Fake is set in the art forgery world where art collectors buy copies of their original paintings to display in their homes. The originals are stored in climate controlled freeholds for insurance purposes.

The publisher's summary:

Can you spot the difference? 

Emma Caan is a fake. 

She’s a forger, an artist who specializes in nineteenth-century paintings. But she isn’t a criminal; her copies are commissioned by museums and ultra-wealthy collectors protecting their investments. Emma’s more than mastered a Gauguin brushstroke and a van Gogh wheat field, but her work is sometimes a painful reminder of the artistic dreams she once chased for herself, when she was younger and before her family and her world fell apart. 

When oligarch art collector Leonard Sobetsky unexpectedly appears with an invitation, Emma sees a way out—a new job, a new path for herself, and access to the kind of money she needs to support her unstable and recently widowed mother. 

But every invitation incurs an obligation . . . and Emma isn’t prepared for what’s to come. As she’s pulled further into Leonard’s opulent scene, she will discover what’s lurking beneath the glitz and glamour. When she does, the past she’s worked hard to overcome will collide with the present, making her wonder how much of her carefully curated life is just as fake as her forgeries . . .

The writing is superb. The story opened with a bang and the suspense continued through the ending. The pacing of events was perfect. While there was a lot of inner dialogue with the Emma character, it did not interfere with the action. She always acted upon her impulses so they were a big part of the story. For someone with an art degree from Yale, she is not the brightest star in the universe. She does not believe that copying art is the same thing as forging an art piece. While I can appreciate that Emma lived paycheck to paycheck, she seemed only to be interested in drinking the best vodka that Leonard could provide and attending the hottest parties. Someone with an art degree should have strong feelings about art. Leonard, known as Lenny, was a typical billionaire, or what I think a billionaire behaves like. His discussion with Emma on how to make money was thought provoking. Leonard said that the only way he was able to make money was by spending money. 

I had never heard of freeholds before. In a freehold state you can maintain secrecy concerning artworks that you have bought or sold. An art collector can avoid paying taxes if their ownership is a secret. Delaware and Switzerland are the freehold states that the collectors in this story use. Wanting more information on freeholds, I went to Wikipedia. However, I found nothing.

I loved this story and am rating it 5 out of 5 stars.

War on Gaza

Renowned cartoonist Joe Sacco recently published his latest book War on Gaza. Sacco is famous for his reporting on life in Gaza. He is well renowned for creating the reportage comic sub-genre. However, this book is less about war on Gaza or war in Gaza but more about "I hate the USA." Only two pages out of the book’s 37 pages is directed against Israel. Three explain why he wrote the book. The remainder express Sacco's hatred of the U.S. and it's leaders.

He mocks our politicians for creating a "kinder, gentler genocide" and drew a line drawing of Biden in a diaper with a dialogue box "patent is pending." Also, we see another drawing of Biden with a scarlet "G" on his forehead which I thought was cute. I like the scarlet letter analogy. In addition, he uses sarcasm to rewrite Biblical passages such as "O, Israel, let a monument be raised atop the flattened cities of Amalek so that future generations will never forget the Miracle of Joe Biden's Hallucination." Of course, the November 2024 presidential election choices are what a "rotting republic deserves."

Sacco describes himself as "our hero cartoonist" out for a stroll. He claims he was walking to a postal box to mail a check to the IRS but that the government stole the check from the box. He might be paranoid but I am inclined to believe that this actually happened. 

This comic is dripping in anger and hate with a ton of sarcasm on every page. I give the author credit for his cleverness but the anti-American attitude was too much for my taste.

The Pot Thief Who Studied Calvin

The Pot Thief Who Studied Calvin was published last month. It is author J. Michael Orenduff's 10th Pot Thief murder mystery. The series features an antique seller who specializes in ancient works of clay and porcelain. Each installment of the series is titled "The Pot Thief Who Studied.  . ." It’s an interesting premise for a series. 

The publisher's summary: 

An Albuquerque ceramics dealer soon turns amateur sleuth after he gets a 3D-printed pot to die for.

Hubie Schuze usually digs through the dirt—often illegally—to find the ancient ceramics he sells in his shop, Spirits in Clay. But thanks to his nephew, Tristan, a computer science student at the University of New Mexico, Hubie receives a unique 3D-printed pot. And after a photo of it runs in the local paper, it becomes a popular item.

Unfortunately, the pot is sought-after by all the wrong people, and strange characters start darkening the doorway of Hubie’s shop. They’re willing to do anything to get their hands on the pot, and after Det. Whit Fletcher summons Hubie to the morgue, he discovers that includes murder. Now, to get to the bottom of things, Hubie must uncover what's so hot about this pot, before the cold-as-ice-killer strikes again. 

I wasn't expecting this story to be a cozy mystery but that's exactly what it is. Our amateur sleuth sells ceramic pots in between telling one joke after another. He is an expert on Calvin, Ross Calvin that is, but had to learn the finer points on John Calvin's predestination theory for his soon to be father-in-law. Ross Calvin wrote Sky Determines: an Interpretation of the Southwest, one of Hubie’s favorite books. This Calvin was a real-life Episcopalian priest whose 1934 book is a classic of New Mexico literature. He also was an adherent on predestination.

The story opened with a prologue at the local Albuquerque morgue where Hubie was present to identify the body. The story then shifts backwards in time to explain how the body ended up there. The first third of the book did not include a murder and I was getting anxious for it to happen so that I could read about the investigation. However, it came more than halfway through the story. The "investigation" consisted of the big reveal where Hubie explained every part of the case to a group of all the possible suspects. 

I had never heard of 3D-printers before. The author gives a good presentation of how they work early in the story. 

"It can operate in several ways. The one I used sets the printer to run its stylus over the surface of an object you want to copy. The movements of the stylus are stored in the printer’s memory. Then you have it follow the pattern of the object it now has in its memory, but this time it’s laying down soft clay as it goes, so it makes an exact duplicate of the object it traced.”

The book ends with a discussion between Hubie and his new bride whether the deceased's death was predestined. This story began and ended with the merits of predestination, which I had originally assumed given the title of the book. Pretty interesting. 

5 out of 5 stars.

The Art Collector

I received a free copy of this lovely mystery from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review. I can honestly say that it is spectacular. The book was published last year on August 28, 2024 and it is the second book in author Susan Bacon's mystery series.

The publisher's summary:  

A Warhol protégé, a Manhattan murder and a long-hidden truth. 

It is February 1987. Seal Larsen is a photographer, denizen of New York’s downtown scene and the subject of one of Andy Warhol’s short films. When she dies in a suspicious fall from the 15th floor of her Manhattan apartment building, her friend and neighbor, Emma Quinn, is determined to find out what happened. A history professor at Columbia University with connections to the intelligence community, Emma soon realizes how little she really knows about her friend.

Exploring Seal’s life, her work, her past, Emma makes her way down to Memphis and to rural Tennessee, putting herself at risk. It’s there, on an isolated 2,000-acre farm, that she begins to grasp the tragedy that defined Seal’s life and the truth about her death.

A sequel to The History Teacher, Susan Bacon's award-winning political mystery, The Art Collector is an intrigue, a puzzle, a plot-twister. It is also an exploration of the value of art and the people who make it and of the culture that fueled Manhattan's art boom in the second half of the twentieth century.

This story hooked me from the start. It perfectly blends art and history along with a spectacular mystery. I love art so the phenomenal amount of art history within the pages of the book also kept me interested. However, a reader who isn't interested in art probably won't like it. That said, it was fascinating that Seal’s connection to Andy Warhol, one of my favorite artists, was a main feature of the story. 

I loved the setting too. The 1980s New York City art scene was mesmerizing. I didn't know much about this era before reading the book and learned alot about how artists and their dealers did business. Another setting included in the book is the Deep South during the 1960s. Seal and her mother came from small town Tennessee. They left Tennessee with an African American cook named Merna and opened a restaurant in Harlem. The final leg of Emma's investigation leads her to a remote Tennessee farm where the final pieces of the puzzle fall into place.

The only complaint I have is that the middle part of the story moved rather slowly. All of the details about various artworks and the artists that created them was probably the reason. 4 out of 5 stars.

The Amish Quiltmaker's Unruly In-Law

When I just want a quiet day of easy reading I reach for an Amish fiction novel. This month I chose two books from the Amish Quiltmaker series by Jennifer Beckstand. In a few days I will review The Amish Quiltmaker's Unconventional  Niece.

In The Amish Quiltmaker's Unruly In-Law quilter Esther Kiem has recently moved to a new Amish settlement in Byler, Colorado. It is a new start for her as well as her husband Levi and baby Winnie. Esther's reckless brother-in-law Ben Kiem is the subject of the story. Mischievous and rebellious, young Ben has been making the wrong kind of name for himself throughout the town of Byler. He and his two buddies, Wally and Simeon, have stolen and destroyed the property of several neighbors. When the story opens Ben attached himself to the back of a buggy owned by the Eicher family and used water skis to ski most of the way on a snowy day. Of course, he gets hurt but he also ruins the back of the buggy.  Mrs. Eicher demands that Ben pay for the repairs but daughter Linda, the same age as Ben, laughed at him for his stupidity. He resents Linda for ridiculing him.

Once Ben and Linda meet, the story takes off. Esther puts her special matchmaking skills to the test. She somehow coaxes Ben into keeping company with the sensible Linda Eicher. Ben can’t see anything that they have in common or that he could ever be good enough for someone like her. Linda has a down-to-earth nature that makes Ben want to live a better Amish life. The suspense in the story is created from the ups and downs in their relationship and there are many.

 

I love the simplicity of Amish fiction but this story read like a mystery novel. There were so many problems that needed to be resolved in Ben and Linda’s relationship. They were complete opposites. Linda followed all the rules of the church while Ben didn't follow any if them even though his father was the bishop. Ben believed if he behaved badly enough times that there would be no expectations of him. There weren't. All of the members of the Byler church steered clear of him. This is Amish fiction so you know there has to be happy ending, and there is.

This was a lovely story to read and I am rating it 4 out of 5 stars.

Book Cover of the Month: January

I love this book cover with its beautiful wintery scene. It was published by Crooked Lane Books and I tried to determine the identity of the book cover designer. The publisher has a cover designer on staff, Meghan Deist. However, I cannot be sure that she designed this book cover. There is currently a job advertisement for remote, freelance cover designers. Deist is also a Letterer for the publisher so I am sure that she had some input into the final design.

Deist has worked as an artist, graphic designer and book cover designer for several other publishers. She has degrees in cultural anthropology and visual arts.

Can't Wait Wednesday #34

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted at the Wishful Endings blog.  We spotlight the books we're excited about that we have yet to read. Generally, they're books that have yet to be released. Find out more here.

I am anxiously awaiting the publication of Matcha Murder. I have not read anything by the author, Kirsten Weiss but my love for matcha tea makes me want to read this book. This 9th Tea and Tarot Cozy Mystery will be published on February 28, 2025.

The main character is Abigail. Together with her partner, Hyperion, the two must sift through a whirlwind of lies to crack the murder of a business coach. Along with sleuthing, Abigail has to deal with her missing boyfriend as well as a storm raging along the California coast.

Let's hope it's a good read.

Book of the Month: January

My favorite book for this month is The Vanishing Hour. It was written by a new, to me, author Seraphina Nova Glass. The suspense in this novel is sky high and it has alot of twists that kept me guessing at the identity of the whodunnit. The plot centers around three missing residents of Rock Harbor, Maine. In addition, five years prior to the action two teenage girls were missing for two weeks and then found dead. The police believe all five crimes could be connected but they have been unable to prove it. The triple narrative is from Kira whose daughter is missing, Aden whose father is missing and Grace who escaped after being kidnapped five years earlier. Friends and relatives of these three are secondary characters who all look guilty. With the police taking their sweet time to investigate, the three compare notes and try to locate their missing relatives. 

This book was a wild ride.

The Vanishing Hour

The Vanishing Hour is my selection for January's Monthly Key Word Reading Challenge. It's author Seraphina Nova Glass's fourth novel but the first of hers that I have read. She is known for writing tightly woven suspense stories. The book was published in May 2023. 

The publisher's summary:

Grace Holloway keeps to herself. Since narrowly escaping death at the hands of the man who kidnapped her, she’s thrown herself into the small inn she runs in Rock Harbor, Maine. It’s quiet, quaint and, in the off-season, completely isolated—the perfect place for Grace to keep her own secrets.

But Grace isn’t the only one with something to hide, and Rock Harbor isn’t just a sleepy vacation town. Someone is taking young women—girls who look an awful lot like Grace did when she was kidnapped so many years ago.

When a surge of disappearances brings the investigation to her door, Grace finds herself unwillingly at the center of it all and doing everything she can to keep her distance. Because Grace knows something…something that could change everything. And when the truth comes to light, getting justice for the vanished might be more than Grace can handle alone…

This book was soooo good! I was hooked from the first chapter. The suspense was built up nicely throughout the story all the way to the end. The story is told through a triple narrative. We read from the perspectives of Grace, Kira Everett (whose daughter is missing) and Aden Coleman (whose father is missing). The book opens with Kira looking for her daughter Brooke. Then we see Aden visiting his mother who is upset that she cannot get a hold of her husband. Aden rents a room at a local hotel that is run by Grace. The Coleman family learns a few days later that the father is actually missing. Each chapter alternates between the viewpoints of these three characters. 

The police aren't sure if the crimes are connected. Kira decides to investigate herself because she doesn't believe that the police are on the ball. Kira soon meets Aden and Grace and together they try to piece together what has happened to their loved ones. Their friends and family are secondary characters who provide twisty turns in the plot. Almost every character becomes a suspect.

What is the vanishing hour? It is 10 pm. Each family had their relative last seen at 10 pm in the same seedy part of town. The media, who has been reporting on these cases, made up the phrase "vanishing hour."

The Vanishing Hour is a thriller with a satisfying ending. Mystery lovers will want to read this one. 5  out of 5 stars.

White Widow

The White Widow:Welcome to Idylhaven anthology collects releases 1 through 4. It was published in July 2024. The main character in this comic is Yelena Belova. She is a superspy and rogue agent. Yelena Belova has been many things, but striking out as a hero in her own right is new. Just as Yelena begins to settle into life in suburbia as a consultant for honest, hardworking assassins, change comes in the form of Armament – a company that seems to infiltrate every aspect of the tiny town of Idylhaven. As she and her neighbors are threatened with eviction, Yelena takes matters into her own hands. After all, she believes that there’s rarely a problem a little murder can’t solve. However, Armament is not quite what it seems, and a single mistake could cost Yelena everything. 

It was difficult to become interested in this story. After finishing the first two sections, I did not see any connection with the publisher's summary of the book. However, I was amused that Yelena was looking for an employer with good health care insurance and that the recruiter for the evil Armament company uses a wheelchair. Her statement was also amusing "the way I see it, every company is a vampire. They're all out for my blood and none of them are ever going to give back to me, not in any meaningful way." While Yelena is deciding which company to join, her buddy buys a cybernetic product from the Mind Your Own Business store which is having a sale. Later, the Idylhaven Academy becomes a charter school. While carrying out assassinations, Yelena and her co-workers discuss the company’s dental plan and rigid prescription coverage. Just a little modernity here with some humor.

As I mentioned above, I did not see any connection between what the story is supposed to be about and what I read. The long discourse on health insurance was humorous but, sadly, this book falls short. I am assuming that there will be another book soon that continues the White Widow story but I could not find any reference to future books. 

2 out of 5 stars.

Stacking the Shelves #34

I don't participate in this meme very often but would like to talk about two graphic novels. War in Gaza by Joe Sacco will probably upset me but it's written by Joe Sacco. He's an icon in the graphic novel world and is known for writing reportage comics. When I first heard about the book I decided not to read it, mainly because I knew it would make me angry. In the past Sacco has written other graphic novels about the Palestinians and he definitely takes their side. I, on the other side, have chosen the side of the Israelis. The Sacco effect has finally happened to me and I am waiting to receive the book in the mail. 

I am also waiting for Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto. This story was just published three days ago. It's a science fiction crime thriller about being forced to find a new home and striving to build a better one. The main character, Edie, has just completed an eight year sentence in an icy prison planet located below the Kepler space station and has vowed to go straight. After her release her accomplice, Angel, offers Edie one last job that will make them rich. Bringing down the trillionaire tech giant that they failed to bring down before is their golden opportunity. As the publisher stated "What could possibly go all hammajang about this plan?" I am looking forward to figuring out what hammajang means.

The Fury

I loved the author’s The Silent Patient and had high expectations for The Fury. Thus, I selected The Fury for this month's entry in the Calendar of Crime Reading Challenge. The book was published in January 2024. 

The publisher's summary: 

This is a tale of murder.

Or maybe that’s not quite true. At its heart, it’s a love story, isn’t it?

Lana Farrar is a reclusive ex–movie star and one of the most famous women in the world. Every year, she invites her closest friends to escape the English weather and spend Easter on her idyllic private Greek island.

I tell you this because you may think you know this story. You probably read about it at the time ― it caused a real stir in the tabloids, if you remember. It had all the necessary ingredients for a press sensation: a celebrity; a private island cut off by the wind…and a murder.

We found ourselves trapped there overnight. Our old friendships concealed hatred and a desire for revenge. What followed was a game of cat and mouse ― a battle of wits, full of twists and turns, building to an unforgettable climax. The night ended in violence and death, as one of us was found murdered.

But who am I?

My name is Elliot Chase, and I’m going to tell you a story unlike any you’ve ever heard.

I did not enjoy the book. I picked up a copy of it because I loved The Silent Patient. My expectation for this book was high but it just never grabbed my attention. There was too much narration and I had to continually think about who the narrator was. During my read, I couldn't figure out why this person was the narrator. After reading one third of the story, the murder finally happened. At the midway point of the story there was still no investigation of the crime. Why? This is supposed to be a psychological thriller.

There wasn't any character development. None of the characters were likable and I think that's due to all the narration. The characters were flat. They did not communicate with each other because the narrator couldn't shut up. He was always promising a new twist but they didn't materialize. I can't help but feel disappointed with the book. While I read it until the end, it never grabbed my attention.

1 out of 5 stars.

Return of the Monarchs

I picked up Return of the Monarchs for the Key Word Challenge. I later realized that the book is only 116 pages long, not long enough to meet the challenge requirements. It was a lovely story just the same.

 

The publisher's summary:

Janelle Herron isn’t interested in having a boyfriend. She wears black clothes, dark makeup, and sees herself metaphorically as a caterpillar who hopes to transform into a butterfly someday. She hopes that she will grow into a vision of herself that she can live with, and she has her reasons—reasons that only her parents are aware of—but that doesn’t include having a romantic relationship. But when she sees a handsome Amish man being harassed by bullies, she gets involved and becomes friends with Thomas Schrock. He’s safe. They can never be together romantically because he’s Amish.

Thomas Schrock is intrigued—and a little embarrassed—when a Goth-looking young English woman intervenes in a one-sided fight Thomas is about to be lured into by three bullies. Janelle is spunky, brave, and might even be pretty behind all the dark makeup she wears. She is easy to talk to, fun to be around, and as they spend more time together, he begins to understand some of the reasons she dresses the way she does. But as Janelle and Thomas’s feelings begin to lean toward romance, Janelle holds tightly to a secret she has no plans to share. Her plan is to stay on course and leave for college at the end of the summer.

But will a magical meadow filled with monarchs and a little divine intervention turn things around for Janelle? Will she finally share her secret with Thomas and become the butterfly she’s always wanted to be?

 

The plot was simple. It’s the usual boy meets girl and they live happily ever after. However, in this story Janelle has to adjust to life with a severe disfigurement after being burned in a fire. That is not an easy or quick adjustment and it's the reason she covers herself up with black clothes and heavy black makeup. She has a long way to go to accept her new physical appearance. This includes running away from people who get too close. Thomas is not shocked at all by the condition of her skin. He accepts her as she is. After Thomas shows her a local butterfly farm, Janelle begins to peel away all the restrictions that she placed on her life. How this story ends isn’t revealed until the Epilogue. I won't be a spoiler.

The story was a quick but satisfying read. 5 out of 5 stars.