Black and Blue

David Rosenfelt's new Doug Brock thriller Black and Blue (#825) is a spin-off from his Andy Carpenter mystery series.  Doug Brock is a New Jersey State Policeman who suffers amnesia and now can't remember previous cases, let alone his personal relationships.  It makes life both home and at the station difficult, to say the least.

When a local business man is shot long through the heart when leaving a public tennis court, there are similarities to a case Doug Brock handled prior to his accident.  He can't remember the details, but he sure hopes that he hasn't let the previous perpetrator walk, especially since Dan Phelan's attorney is local defense attorney Andy Carpenter.  But the victims keep piling up, and Doug starts receiving taunting notes from the shooter both at the station and at home.  When Doug and his girlfriend Jessie, a fellow police officer, start putting together some clues, it's apparent that something even bigger is planned rather than just seemingly random victims.  Can they figure out the motive before the killer acts?

It's a typically well-plotted thriller with plenty of red herrings, but this time, it's tied to a police procedural.  Yes, of course, there's a dog, Jessie's Bobo, who isn't too fond of Doug, but who still manages to be in the right place at the right time.  I hope we see much more of Doug Brock, his girlfriend Jessie  and his large partner Nate in the future.

A Well-Behaved Woman - A Novel of the Vanderbilts

The principal character in Therese Anne Fowler's A Well-Behaved Woman - A Novel of the Vanderbilts (#824) is Alva Smith Vanderbilt.  I found it interesting as I was reading Ms. Fowler's introduction to her novel that she did not initially like or want to write about Alva Vanderbilt based on contemporary comments on her.  This happened to be in the middle of the 2016 presidential campaign when Hilary Clinton was being pilloried by the press.  Ms. Fowler said it occurred to her that the same thing might have happened to Alva Vanderbilt, and that actions that would have been admired, even applauded by society and the popular press had they been done by men were heaped with scorn simply because Alva was a woman.  That changed the focus of her novel, and in her A Well-Behaved Woman, she gives us an Alva Vanderbilt worth reading about.

Alva came from a Southern family ruined by the Civil War, and it became imperative for her to marry well in order to support her invalid father and three unmarried sisters.  With the help of her wealthy friend Consuelo Yzanga, Alva succeeded in winning a proposal from William K. Vanderbilt, the boyishly charming scion of the wealthy Vanderbilts.  What the Vanderbilts did not possess was an entry into the closed circle of New York Society.  Alva could provide that with her pedigree.  Just how she accomplished this and rose to the top of the social pecking order makes for a fascinating tale.  Her success certainly did not come without a steep price tag, but Alva was willing to pay it to advance the interests of her family and ultimately, American women through her dedication to the cause of Suffrage, although that is a tale for another book.

Ms. Fowler has certainly done her homework on Alva Smith Vanderbilt.  I Googled one of the portraits of Alva Vanderbilt mentioned in the book and stumbled on a treasure trove of on-line portraits of Alva and her family, and in particular, contemporary descriptions and photos of a spectacular Costume Ball thrown by Alva in their new Fifth Avenue home.  To see the costumes and people described attending the ball made me feel like one of the hoi polloi standing outside the mansion the night of the ball, trying to catch a glimpse of the cream of society entering the Vanderbilt home.

I also particularly liked the cover design of this book; the design cleverly incorporated the Vanderbilt "V" with a photo which I suspect was of a model much more attractive than the real life Alva.  It certainly was enough to make me pick up this book, and I'm glad I did; I found it a thoroughly enjoyable read about how the "1%" lives.

The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared

The Swedish novel, The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared (#823) by Jonas Jonasson has been an international bestseller.  It is amusing, but for my part, I did find it overly long.

The opening of the book was promising with centenarian Allan Karlsson making his escape from the Old Folks Home just hours before they were to celebrate his 100th birthday, the last thing he wanted, but who listens to senior citizens?  He accidentally gets caught up with stolen drug money, and that plot line was a good story.  Where the book lost me, though, was how Allan Karlsson supposedly met up with many of the most prominent world movers and shakers of the twentieth century as he ping-ponged around the globe.  Chapters dealing with his past adventures were interspersed with his modern day escape.  By the end of the book, I had come to find it all a bit tedious.

Not a horrible read, but I've certainly read many much more entertaining books.  Just my opinion.

Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen

Historical fiction is a wonderful tool in the right hands; it can bring the past vividly alive.  That's what Sarah Bird has done with her novel Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen (#822).  Cathy Williams, the central character in this book, was a real person.  She was a black woman who served for two years with the famed Buffalo Soldiers in the West.  Her secret didn't come out until after she had served.  Not much else is known about her, but in Ms. Bird's story, it's easy to imagine how it could have been to go from slavery in the antebellum South to being contraband following General Philip Sheridan's forces, and at the end of the war, deciding not to go back to a South where the attitudes about slaves hadn't changed even though the Yankees had won the war.  When the promise of a new life out West was raised at the end of the war, Cathy was determined to take it, but the only way to do it safely was to pass as a man.

It was never an easy life, but Cathy Williams throughout it all remained true to herself; as the daughter of a daughter of a queen captured in Africa and brought to America.  Through this book, her story won't be forgotten; it deserves to be told.

The Lost Girls of Paris

I enjoyed reading Pam Jenoff's latest World War II novel, The Lost Girls of Paris (#821).  But I couldn't help but think as I was reading that it all sounded familiar: British women dropped into Nazi-occupied France prior to the Normandy Invasion to sabotage, arm the French Resistance and communicate with London by wireless radios, even down to the "six weeks life expectancy" for the wireless operators.

What makes this book different is the way the story is introduced.  A New York City war widow is late for work one morning and is forced to cut through Grand Central Station due to an accident blocking the streets outside.  Inside, Grace finds an abandoned suitcase under a bench in the terminal.  Does Grace do what most people would do?  Of course not!  She has to open the suitcase and search the contents, ostensibly to find a clue to the owner's identity.  What she finds instead is a packet of twelve photos of young women, some in uniform, each labeled only with a first name.  She puts the suitcase back, but Grace hangs onto the photos.  As she learns later on the news, the suitcase belonged to a British woman who was killed right outside Grand Central Station that morning.  Her efforts to reunite the photos with their rightful owner plunges Grace into a mystery concerning the photos.

The story unfolds between three women; Grace, who found the photos, Eleanor Trigg, the owner of the suitcase, and Marie Roux, one of the girls in the mysterious photos, ping-ponging between post-war New York, London's SOE and its covert missions during the war, and occupied France where Marie has been assigned.

Without giving anything else away, the novel pulls the reader into the story and makes the characters of the three different women compelling, each in her own way.  What did happen to Marie and her companions, and why does Eleanor care so much?  Why does Grace feel it is incumbent on her to complete Eleanor's mission?  You'll just have to read The Lost Girls of Paris to find out!

Look Alive Twenty-Five

There's nothing like one of Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum novels to put a smile on my face.  In Look Alive Twenty-Five (#820), the action takes place in the Red River Deli in Trenton, New Jersey, which Stephanie has been informed by her boss is now added to her job duties to handle since it defaulted to Vinnie's Bail Bond office.  One problem, though; three of the previous managers of the deli have mysteriously vanished into thin air, leaving only a single shoe behind.  Stephanie has no intention of becoming the next victim.

Nothing seems to be going Stephanie's way between having no experience running a deli (or wanting to!), Lula's exotic sandwich creations and a pair of short order cooks who cope with their jobs by staying mellow on weed.  Nor are things going well with her bond enforcement gig trying to get any of her FTA clients back to the courthouse to be re-bonded.  Now, as manager, she also has a target painted on her back as a potential kidnap victim.  The good news is that between boyfriend Joe Morelli and hunky Ranger's high-tech security firm, Stephanie is never alone.  That has its good points and its downside, especially when one of her security team is snatched from behind the deli.  Who's behind the goings-on, and for what purpose?

There's the usual mix of crazy characters, bizarre happenings and mystery to keep the reader turning the pages.  There's no heavy lifting with these stories, but they accomplish what the author sets out to do: entertain.  They're always a great escape.

The Malta Exchange

I always find the historical hooks in Steve Berry's novels intriguing.  There's always something to do further reading on long after I've finished the novel.  In this case, I was particularly interested to find his latest Cotton Malone novel The Malta Exchange (#819) involved two locales I recently visited: Malta and Rome.

Cotton Malone and Luke Daniel  of the US Justice Department's Magellan Billet are pulled separately into tracking down mysterious documents supposedly in Mussolini's possession when he was killed in 1945.  Although the two satchels he carried with him trying to escape to Switzerland are known to have contained gold, jewels and assorted documents, neither have been seen since the day of his death.  Until Cotton in his capacity of antiquarian book dealer is called in by the British to broker a deal for one of the satchels in Italy.  Nothing goes according to plan, of course.

Luke, in the meantime, has been dispensed to Malta to keep an eye on Cardinal Kastor Gallo who should be heading for Rome within hours to join the papal conclave about to start.  What is he doing in Malta at such a crucial time, and why are people trying to kill Luke for keeping an eye on him?

As the plot unfolds and the body count mounts, both the Vatican and the ancient order of The Knights of Malta are involved, playing their own high stakes games with the fate of both organizations at risk.

Steve Berry's shocking denouement, though fictional, will come as no surprise to students of EfM, but he does do an excellent job of describing the unique island of Malta and Vatican City itself.  His descriptions of the co-cathedral located in Valletta are so accurate about its astonishing beauty, I stopped to pull out my phone to flip through the many photos I took there.  The inlaid marble floor tombs he includes in the plot are real, each more amazing than the last.  And who can fail to be awed by the splendor of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome?  Reading a good book set in places you've seen with your own eyes doubles the fun.  This is definitely the case here.