THE ICE CREAM QUEEN OF ORCHARD STREET by Susan Jane Gilman

July 4, 2014

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The Treynovsky family escaped the pogroms in Russia and emmigrated to the lower east side of New York, where Malka grew up to become Lillian Dunkle, the eponymous ice cream queen in Susan Jane Gilman’s charming first novel. Her journey from poverty stricken immigrant to enormously successful ice cream magnate is the quintessential American story.

The streets of New York are not always the safest place for children, teeming with vendors and their push carts. Malka is out one day when the Italian ices man’s horse accidentally crushes her leg in a truly Dickensian moment. Malka’s father takes off, her mother can’t handle it and ends up in a sanitarium. Mr. Dinello feels guilty for crippling the child and takes her in, so this Jewish immigrant girl is raised by an Italian immigrant family. The Italian ices cart grows into an ice cream factory and Malka learns the business until both Mr. and Mrs. Dinello pass away. Their sons form a partnership and a new company, and leave her out in the cold.

Revenge drives Malka, who eventually changes her name to the more American sounding Lillian. She meets Albert Dunkle, a movie star handsome Jewish immigrant with a bad stutter. She tries to help him and they fall in love and marry. Together they start up Dunkle’s Ice Cream. Albert invents a machine that makes soft serve ice cream (think Carvel here, I certainly did) and they become hugely successful. But vindictiveness against the Dinello family fuels Lillian’s fire, and she won’t be happy until they are out of business. Lillian is an unscrupulous businesswoman, and eventually her chickens come home to roost.

This is a family story about the immigrant experience in America, told with a lot of humor and pathos. The characters come alive on these pages and while you may not always like Lillian Dunkle, you can’t help but cheer her on.

7/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

THE ICE CREAM QUEEN OF ORCHARD STREET by Susan Jane Gilman. Grand Central Publishing (June 10, 2014). ISBN 978-0446578936. 512p.

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Posted by Stacy Alesi

THE TROOP by Nick Cutter

July 3, 2014

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Dr. Tim Riggs and the boys of Troop 52 look forward to their annual camping trip with great anticipation. For Tim, it means a chance to get away from it all. For the boys, it means a weekend in the wild without their parents watching over them. But this year is different. A starving and sickly man arrives at the cabin begging for food. As a doctor, Tim feels it’s his duty to help; as troop leader, though, he knows he must protect the boys. He keeps them isolated at first, but soon realizes that the man is carrying a parasite that he himself has already been exposed to. Soon the boys are alone, forced to fend for themselves on an island cut off from the world with a terrifying infection spreading amongst them.

Nick Cutter (aka Craig Davidson) has created a tale that is truly the stuff of nightmares. The Troop is creepy as all get out – something one always hopes for with new horror – but it’s also incredibly gross. I think it’s safe to say that readers without a strong stomach may take issue with this one.

As I said, it is the stuff of nightmares. Five teenage boys and their troop leader camping on a remote and uninhabited island off the coast of Prince Edward Island with supplies for a three day trip as well as a radio for emergencies would seem to be fairly prepared for just about anything. Anything except a raging stranger riddled with parasites who then destroys said radio and infects the only other adult on the island. The first symptom of infection: unquenchable hunger. You can imagine what happens next.

In a move definitely inspired by Lord of the Flies the boys turn on their troop leader and then one another. Cutter/Davidson does an excellent job spinning a tale packed with gut-clenching tension and gory detail. The characters are compelling, especially once we REALLY get to know a few of them (that’s an added wrinkle to an already twisted story), and the use of interviews, articles, and testimony adds an extra layer to the story development that I thought was particularly engaging.

The Troop may not be the best book to take on a summer camping trip (or maybe it is if you’re a glutton for punishment) but it’s certainly one any hardy horror fan will not want to miss.

7/14 Becky Lejeune

THE TROOP by Nick Cutter. Gallery Books; First Edition edition (February 25, 2014). ISBN 978-1476717715. 368p.

1 Comment | Book Reviews, Fiction, Horror | Permalink
Posted by Stacy Alesi

ONE PLUS ONE by JoJo Moyes

July 2, 2014

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It is always difficult to follow up a beloved book like Me Before You, but I think Moyes fans will be happy with her latest – I was. This is another contemporary romance, but in a more traditional way.

Jess is a single mom who is barely scraping by. Her husband walked out two years previously but is living with his mother and hasn’t sent any money or even seen his own kids. Jess’s daughter Tanzie is an 8 year old math prodigy, and she also takes in her stepson, Nicky, a teenager with some social issues who is getting beaten up on a regular basis by a neighborhood family of ne’er-do-wells.

Jess works all the time, cleaning houses by day and tending bar by night. She juggles her bills, keeping one step ahead by robbing Peter to pay Paul, and manages to keep food on the table, but just barely. When Tanzie’s math teacher calls to say that Tanzie has earned the possibility of a scholarship to a prestigious private school, Jess is dubious about even being able to pay the registration fee.

Then one of her cleaning clients, Ed, a rude dot com millionaire, gets drunk at the pub where she works. She manages to get a friend to drive him home, but when she gets back in the car she finds a wad of bills. Jess is a very moral character, but desperate for the registration fee, she takes the money and swears to herself that she will pay it back.

Ed has troubles of his own. In trying to dump a girlfriend, he inadvertently gives her inside information and she makes a killing in the stock market. He doesn’t make a dime but the cops come after him anyway.

Tanzie is offered the opportunity to participate in a math competition with prize money enough to cover the private school expenses, except it is in Scotland and Jess can’t afford the train fare. Desperate, she decides to drive, taking a an old broken down Rolls Royce that’s been stored in her garage for more than 2 years. No license and no insurance is a recipe for disaster and sure enough, the cops impound the car.

Ed happens by and stops to help. He ends up driving them all to Scotland, a four day trip, and Jess and Ed fall in love along the way. They both have a lot of baggage, but can they get past all their issues? Will these kids work out their problems?

Moyes writes great characters, and I will not be forgetting these anytime soon. This was a really enjoyable, fast read that should please her legion of fans.

7/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

ONE PLUS ONE by JoJo Moyes. Pamela Dorman Books (July 1, 2014). ISBN 978-0525426585. 384p.

2 Comments | Book Reviews, Fiction, Romance, Women's Fiction | Permalink
Posted by Stacy Alesi

ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by Anthony Doerr

June 30, 2014

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This is the story of a blind French girl and a mathematically inclined German boy in World War II occupied France, and it is one of the most beautifully written and memorable novels that I’ve read in a long time.

I heard about it through Library Reads, it was one of the top ten picks for May. I have found some terrific books through this list of librarian favorites, and I urge you to check it out.

Marie Laure goes blind when she’s six years old. She lives with her father in Paris near the museum where he is a locksmith. He builds her a minature village to scale of their neighborhood and teaches her to navigate on her own. But when the Germans invade Paris, they flee to Saint-Malo to stay with Marie Laure’s uncle, who is a severe agoraphobic. He has a multi-story home on the sea that he shares with a housekeeper/caretaker.

Meanwhile Werner is a 14 year old boy living with his sister in an orphanage in Germany. He is selected to test for engineering school, where he excels. But school under the Third Reich is difficult for Werner. His best friend is a gentle soul and he knows nothing good can come of that in the land of Hitler Youth. Werner is eventually sent out to hunt down illegal transmitters, and that is how he spends the last few years of  his childhood, and the war.

Marie Laure is growing up, and grows very close to both the housekeeper and her uncle. When her father goes missing, they care for her. Eventually Saint-Malo becomes a closed city, and life is very difficult for those still living there. Food, even water, are scarce and freedom becomes a thing of the past.

Werner’s and Marie Laure’s stories ebb and flow, moving back and forth in time and place until inevitably they meet. The war is their backdrop, but the book, surprisingly, is about the kindness people can show one another, even in extraodinarily difficult times.

Reading groups will love this as universal themes of love, war, deception, loyalty, impairments and more will offer great fodder for discussion. Most of the chapters are extremely short, and even though it is a highly descriptive novel, the story moves and is quite gripping, I couldn’t put it down.

All the Light We Cannot See is one of my favorite books so far this year.

6/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by Anthony Doerr. Scribner; First Edition edition (May 6, 2014). ISBN 978-1476746586. 544p.

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DEEP BLUE by Jennifer Donnelly

June 29, 2014

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Waterfire Saga, Book One

Serafina has been preparing for ages for her betrothal ceremony. The ceremony consists of three parts: the first will test her as a true descendant of Merrow’s bloodline; the second is the songspell she must sing to perfection; the third will bind her to her husband-to-be as well as the kingdom of Miromara. Unfortunately, what should be one of the happiest days of her life soon turns tragic as the kingdom is overcome by invaders. Sera’s mother is shot and Sera is forced to run with only her friend Neela by her side. The young mermaid is left with the uncertainty of her mother’s fate – and whether she has now become Regina of Miromara in her place.

With assassins on their tails, the two girls soon come to a shocking realization: the invasion of Miromara is linked to a dream that has been plaguing them both. In the dream, the girls witnessed the Iele (sea witches they thought were only children’s stories) singing of six mermaids tasked with saving the oceans from a creature known as Abbadon. And Sera and Neela aren’t the only ones aware of the Iele’s prophecy. The mer trying to capture them has heard the legend as well and he has no desire at all in seeing Abbadon defeated.

On the one hand Deep Blue is an excellent example of world building. The reader is literally immersed in the undersea setting from the very start. The history and mythology of the world are fascinating and the imagery is vibrant.

On the other hand this teen title reads much younger than I’d expected. Serafina and her peers all come across more flighty and immature than I’d thought they would based on their character set up. They’re all supposed to be about sixteen (or older in some cases) so some of that’s to be expected, especially allowing for the expected coming-of-age bit of character development, but it left me with the overall sense that the best audience for the book is on the early end of the teen spectrum.

6/14 Becky Lejeune
DEEP BLUE by Jennifer Donnelly. Disney-Hyperion (May 6, 2014). ISBN 978-1423133162. 352p.

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Posted by Stacy Alesi

THE ACCIDENT by Chris Pavone

June 28, 2014

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The Accident is a somewhat more conventional thriller than Pavone’s fine debut (The Expats, 2012), but he excels at developing characters back stories.

New York literary agent Isabel Reed plows through an anonymous manuscript in one night and immediately knows two things: the manuscript, a biography of a media mogul, will be a blockbuster, and people will die if word of its existence leaks. She’s also fairly sure she knows who the author is, but he’s dead – or is he?

Word does leak, in New York and Hollywood, and ambitious young women in publishing quickly die violently. Isabel and her chosen editor, Jeffrey Fielder, are on the run from resourceful, relentless killers.

Pavone’s plot twists nicely, shifting focus among a large cast of well-drawn characters and using flashbacks and changes of locale (Copenhagen, Zurich, Manhattan, Hollywood, the Hamptons) to build suspense. Isabel and Jeffrey, for example, are successful but frightened that changes in their business and the onset of middle age might make them has-beens, and they’re both recalling the mutual attraction they once had but didn’t act on.

Like Isabel, many readers will read this one through the night. Highly recommended.

6/14 Jack Quick

THE ACCIDENT by Chris Pavone. Crown; First Edition edition (March 11, 2014). ISBN 978-0385348454. 400p.

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Posted by Stacy Alesi

DUALED by Elsie Chapman

June 27, 2014

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Some people say that everyone has a twin somewhere in the world, but for West Grayer this is her reality.

After the universal cold vaccine left everyone sterile, it was up to science to ensure the continuation of the human race. With war waging everywhere, a small group set off to begin their own city. Citizens of Kersh are protected from the wars of the Surround, and each section of the city produces a necessary commodity. But with the population now healthy and booming, resources have become limited. To ensure that only the strongest and most worthy survive, each child is born with a genetic twin, or alternate. When they come of age, each twin is set with the task of killing their alt in order to complete.

West has lost everyone she loves. Her mother was a PK or peripheral kill, and her father couldn’t take the loss. Her older brother Aave and her younger sister Ehm both died at their alt’s hands. She and her brother Luc are the only ones left until she loses him as well. But now West has to set aside her misery because her own assignment has come up, and her alt is going to be ruthless, set on her own survival.

This new series from Elsie Chapman is dark, dark, dark. It’s a teen read similar in theme to other dystopians (like the Hunger Games) and (also like the Hunger Games) features a strong female lead. In spite of those similarities, Dualed is fairly different from other titles in the dystopian vein. West is an assassin and much of the book takes on an urban warfare kind of feel. There is a romance but it’s almost pushed to the background with the main plot focused on West’s finding and surviving her assignment. The world building and politics are fairly light in this first outing, but are featured more prominently in its sequel, Divided.

6/14 Becky Lejeune

DUALED by Elsie Chapman. Ember; Reprint edition (May 27, 2014). ISBN 978-0307931559. 320p.

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Posted by Stacy Alesi

TALK by Michael Smerconish

June 26, 2014

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Narrated by James Edward Thomas

I must admit to having a bit of a crush on Smerconish, so when I heard he wrote a novel I wanted it. I might have been happier had he read it, or not – usually authors are terrible readers, but despite the narrator (who did an excellent job,) I still had Smerconish’s voice in my head.

I thought the name was pronounced “Smer CONE ish,” like my name should be pronounced “A LEE see” (but rarely is) but turns out it’s “Smer KAHN ish.” I like learning stuff, and this was only the beginning.

If you are not familiar with Smerconish, he is a long time talk radio host based out of Philadelphia airing on Syrius XM’S Potus channel and more recently, host of his own TV show on CNN. I found him during his four years of guest hosting for Chris Matthews on MSNBC, but he’s not a left leaning liberal. He’s much more middle of the road, so CNN seems like a good fit.

Talk centers around a right wing talk radio host, Stan Powers, based out of Tampa but with an eye on the national stage. While Stan doesn’t necessarily espouse all the drivel he spiels, he likes his paycheck and is willing to do what it takes to get on top of the ultra competitive media pile.

Set slightly in the future, the liberal president (after Obama) has decided not to run for re-election, causing both parties to move into high gear for the primaries. The frontrunning Democrat is the governor of Florida, so Stan is in a good place for national attention.

The machinations of talk radio, political TV, and the politicians themselves was just fascinating. Stan is a great character, flawed but very likeable, and he’s surrounded by a cast of interesting people from his agent to his mentor to the first lady of Florida, with whom he had a brief college fling. The characters all ring true, which may be unfortunate, but nonetheless help make the story all the more compelling.

This is the first “adult” audiobook that I’ve listened to that held my attention throughout. Smerconish is a smart cookie, writing about what he knows, and anyone who listens to talk radio or watches FOX or MSNBC will be hooked on Talk – I was.

6/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

TALK by Michael Smerconish. Audible Audio Edition. Audible Studios (May 6, 2014). ASIN B00JRABMY2. Listening Length: 8 hours and 31 minutes.

Hardcover: Cider Mill Press (May 6, 2014). ISBN 978-1604334906. 272p.

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Posted by Stacy Alesi

THE MARRYING OF CHANI KAUFMAN by Eve Harris

June 25, 2014

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I found this book on the long list for the Mann Booker prize in 2013 and it was published here in the U.S. by Grove Press in April.

I always find books about the Orthodox Jewish community fascinating, it’s a whole different culture from anything I’ve personally experienced. This story is set in London, which adds another layer to the story.

Chani Kaufman is getting married. She’s 19, she’s had three dates with Baruch, who is looking for a wife before he goes off to Jerusalem to rabbinical school. Baruch comes from a very wealthy family, but Chani does not. Her father is a good man, a rabbi himself, but of a small congregation.

Baruch’s mother is none too pleased with her son’s choice. She wants him to find a rich girl to subsidize his studies, and to keep things on an even playing field. But Baruch sticks to his guns and Chani thwarts her future mother-in-law’s plans to end the relationship.

The book is about these families, and also about the Rebbetzin that Chani is studying with. She is a deeply unhappy character, and the book moves between these various characters and  their families, as well as moving back and forth in time, but it is always interesting and easy to follow. Definitely for fans of Naomi Ragen’s books or The Innocents by Francesca Segal.

6/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

THE MARRYING OF CHANI KAUFMAN by Eve Harris. Grove Press, Black Cat (April 1, 2014). ISBN 978-0802122735. 384p.

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TOP SECRET TWENTY-ONE by Janet Evanovich

June 24, 2014

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There is something comforting about the Stephanie Plum series. For the most part, the books come like clockwork every June. The characters were developed long ago (21 books ago, in fact) and don’t age or grow or change. Some people don’t like that in their characters and books, but I love these characters – I’m invested in them. I don’t want them to change and apparently neither do millions of readers, and Evanovich respects that.

All the usual suspects are here; Stephanie Plum, the world’s most inept bond enforcement officer, along with her sidekick, the former “ho” Lula, are after Jimmy Poletti, one of Trenton’s wealthier car dealers. Turns out Jimmy was dealing more than cars, and when he jumps bail, Stephanie and Lula are on the case.

Jimmy’s poker buddies are dying quickly and violently, and his former accountant, the nasty little person, Randy Briggs, is the object of several bombing attempts. Briggs convinces Stephanie to house him, and she figures he’ll be the bait to bring Poletti out of hiding. Another skip is a homeless man with 10 chihuahas, and Stephanie & Briggs end up babysitting the dogs.

Meanwhile, Rangeman has been the subject of a chemical attack, forcing Ranger and his men into a safehouse. A Russian hit man is after Ranger, and Stephanie gets caught up in the trouble as well, landing in an Atlantic City casino. Grandma Mazur is working her way through her bucket list, she and Lula show up, and Morelli suffers through all the insanity with his usual charm.

This was a quick afternoon read for me, and as a bonus there’s a short story at the end featuring Kate O’Hara and Nick Fox, the protagonists of Evanovich’s other series (written with Lee Goldberg.) If you haven’t read those, this is a nice introduction to the new series (2 books so far,) which I like a lot.

6/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

TOP SECRET TWENTY-ONE by Janet Evanovich. Bantam (June 17, 2014). ISBN 978-0345542922. 352p.

2 Comments | Book Reviews, Crime Fiction, Fiction | Tagged: | Permalink
Posted by Stacy Alesi

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