Post on New Year's Day...

Well, there’s really no excuse.  I don’t know what happened, except to say that “December happened”, the only excuse I can come up with.  I guess I haven’t been posting this past month because I’ve been reading so much!  I have five books to tell you about (very briefly!), then I’ll have my usual “Best of” lists to start off the first post of the new year. 

The first book I’ll tell you about is A Family Matter by Claire Lynch.  This debut novel tells the story of a lesbian mother’s fight for custody of her daughter in Britain in the 1980s, and is set in dual timelines, one in 1982 and the other in 2022, focusing on family secrets, prejudices, grief, love and loss.  It was an excellent novel that explores the ways in which the past affect and shape the present and future, and how what we know can come unraveled when family secrets are brought to light. 

The next book is Cold as Hell by Kelley Armstrong, book #3 in the “Haven’s Rock” series.  Casey and Eric are still ironing out the bugs of running a town and trying to do better than Rockton, and their efforts are complicated by Casey’s complicated pregnancy.   She’s already had two scares and has been prescribed more rest, less chasing criminals, a prescription she’s (mostly) adhering to.  When one of the women from the town leaves The Roc after a night of drinking and socializing, only to find herself woozier and more dizzy than her few drinks warrant, she gets nervous but is attacked and dragged in the woods before she can do anything about it.  Fortunately she’s rescued by another resident and no harm comes to her, but as they try to figure out what happened and who slipped the drugs into her drink so that they can reprimand the perpetrator, another woman goes missing during a snow storm and is found naked in the snow days later.  Who can Casey and Eric trust, and who will conduct the investigation and keep the townspeople safe in case they have to leave town due to yet another pregnancy scare or early labour?  Armstrong’s books are always a pleasure to read, and this was no exception.  They are dependable, consistent and complex, and while at first this one seemed more focused on “baby” than “crime”, the plot got very twisty very quickly and it was really a race against time and the elements to see if peace and safety could be restored to Haven’s Rock… but the very ending, which I can’t tell you about, was the icing on the cake! 

I also read a new mystery by Michael Robotham, The White Crow, featuring Detective Constable Philomena McCarthy.  Phil is the daughter of a renowned London crime boss, but no convictions ever stuck.  She’s hoping that she can keep the two sides of her identity separate and secret, at least from her colleagues, but when she discovers a child wandering the streets one night while on patrol, she unwittingly becomes entwined in a complicated case involving her father and uncles, as well as at least one ruthless killer.  Can she help solve the case despite her family connections, and is it even safe for her to do so?  This book was as good as I’ve come to expect from Robotham, not his best, in my opinion, but still very, very good.  I suspect that this will be another new series, along with the “Joseph McLoughlin” and “Cyrus Haven” series, all excellent series. 

I read Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice, a post-apocalyptic thriller set in a northern Anishnaabe community, for my January book club meeting that will happen on Saturday.  When the satellite service, then cell service, then electricity all go out in this small community, at first no one worries too much, as these things are always going out, just not usually all at the same time.  But when two college boys from the South return to their community, they bring tales of the same issues happening in the cities and the chaos and deaths that ensue.  The community members mostly know how to hunt and can take care of themselves and each other, but when a mysterious white man arrives asking for help, they don’t know if they can, or should, trust him.  You’ll have to read the book to find out what happens, but let me tell you that it’s not uplifting and left me with more questions than answers.  I guess there’s a sequel, Moon of the Turning Leaves, that may provide answers, but I’m not ready to read another depressing book yet… maybe in the spring. 

And last but certainly not least, I read This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel, which was awesome!  This novel explores the challenges of raising a transgender child, but it was so much more than that.  It explores marriage and family, growing up and staying together, and so very much more.  It reminded me so much of Catherine Newman’s book Sandwich (probably my favourite book of the year), but was like a prequel.  I loved it!  

OK, now it’s time to sum up the year in reading.  I read 58 books and listened to 18 audiobooks last year.  Here are my “Best of 2025” lists:

Best Adult Fiction

This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel
A Family Matter by Claire Lynch
Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip WIlliams
Audition by Katie Kitamura

What We Can Know by Ian McEwan
Endling by Maria Reva
Denison Avenue by Christina Wong
A Great Country by Shiilpa Gowda
Code Name Hélène by Auriel Lawhon
Like Mother, Like Mother by Susan Rieger
Storm Child and The While Crow by Michael Robotham
Slow Dance by Rainbow Rowell
Last Flight by Julie Clarke
Sandwich and Wreck by Catherine Newman
The Believers by Zoë Heller
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
We Are Watching by Alison Gaylin
The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters
The Death of Us by Abigail Dean
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz
Cold as Hell by Kelley Armstrong
Women Talking by Miriam Toews

WOW, that’s 24 books, which means nearly half of the books I read last year were winners !  And many of the others were great books but they were for the Silver Birch award and I’m not listing them here.  I do have a few others on a separate list, combining Non-Fiction and YA:

Red Pockets by Alice May (NF)
The Secret Life of a Cemetery:  the wild nature and enchanting lore of Père LaChaise by Benoît Gallot (NF)

No Mud, No Lotus:  the art of transforming suffering by Thich Nhat Hanh (NF)
Someone is Always Watching by Kelley Armstrong (YA)

And the Best Audiobooks of 2025 are:

Christine Falls by Benjamin Black
The Women by Kristen Hannah
How to Age Disgracefully by Clare Pooley
The Lie Maker by Linwood Barclay
The Better Sister by Alifair Burke
Death at the Sign of the Rook by Kate Atkinson
Stay with Me by Ayòbámi Adébáyò

Phew!  That’s a lot for a single post!  But now I’m all caught up and will try to post more regularly in the new year.  Happy 2026!  May your year be filled with an abundance of books books! 

Bye for now…

Julie

Long overdue...

WOW, I’ve never gone for a whole month without posting!  I’ve read plenty of great books these past weeks, but I guess it’s just been so busy that I haven’t had time to write.  So here is a very brief summary of each book and my thoughts on them… 

After Dark by Japanese author Haruki Murakami is set in Tokyo and follows one young woman over the course of one night.  Mari Asai is sitting alone reading at a Denny’s restaurant after midnight when she is approached by a man claiming to know her sister.  He invites himself to sit and they begin talking, leading to a night of unexpected encounters, while her sister appears trapped in some sort of strange sleep/dream.  This was a really interesting book, not my usual type of reading material, but unusual and compelling.  I would recommend this to anyone who is in the mood for a poetic, trance-like read. 

Audition by American author Katie Kitamura opens with the meeting of two actors in a Manhattan restaurant.  The main character is an aging actress who is meeting this much younger, very attractive male actor, but the nature of their relationship is not clear until much later in the book, and even then, there’s still some questions left unanswered.  This short book was like a cross between Edward Albee’s play Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Ian McEwan’s The Comfort of Strangers.  And I was thankful that it was so short, because, as compelling as the story was, I found it incredibly difficult to read and understand.  Still, it was very, very interesting and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys character-driven novels that explore complex relationships, and thought-provoking books that leave readers with more questions than answers. 

We’ll Prescribe You a Cat by Japanese author Syou Ishida reads like a collection of short stories all connected by the Nakagyō Koroko Clinic for the Soul in Kyoto, where troubled people go to find help.  This unusual clinic doesn’t require an appointment and seems to be on a street in a building that is not easy to find, nor is it visible to everyone, only those who need it most.  The nurse is cold and detached and the doctor, after listening to the most basic facts about the problems the patient is experiencing, instead of prescribing medication, says “We’ll prescribe you a cat.”  The patient is handed a cat in a carrier, a bag with the most basic of essentials and a sheet of instructions, and sent home.  According to the doctor, most every problem can be solved with a cat, and these patients discover this to be true, although there’s an interesting, bizarre, fantasy element with a very sad backstory, and, like After Dark and Audition, there is no clear ending when all threads of the story are wrapped up neatly and explained.  This book, described as an “award-winning, bestselling Japanese novel that has become an international sensation” (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/763041/well-prescribe-you-a-cat-by-syou-ishida-translated-by-e-madison-shimoda/)  was certainly interesting, and I’m so glad I read it, but I don’t think I’ll read the sequel, We’ll Prescribe You Another Cat, at least not right away (although I agree that most problems can, indeed, be solved with a cat!). 

The Berry Pickers by Canadian author Amanda Peters, set in the early 1960s, opens with a Mi’kmaq family from Nova Scotia arriving in Maine to pick berries, as they’ve done every summer for years.  When the youngest child in the family, four-year-old Ruthie, goes missing after her older brother Joe leaves her sitting on a rock, the family begins to fall apart, especially the brother, Joe, who bears the guilt and responsibility for her abduction.  As he lay dying, Joe relates his experiences after Ruthie’s abduction, and it’s clear that his guilt has a significant impact on the decisions he makes and the actions he takes over the next five decades. There is also a parallel narrative from Norma, who is growing up in a middle-class white family in Maine.  Norma is troubled with vague memories of another woman she thinks is her mother, as well as older siblings, although her mother tells her they are just dreams, and that she’s an only child after many miscarriages.  Norma grows up with the weight of these dead babies on her shoulders, as her mother rarely lets her out of her sight and never allows her to do anything that might be even slightly risky.  As she grows up and begins to make decisions for herself, we see the impacts living with this family has on Norma, and begin to understand how this abduction (I’m not giving anything away here!) has changed the lives of all of Ruthie’s and Joe’s family members.  This novel, which thankfully has a very clear ending where all questions are answered, explores family relationships, grief, guilt, and attitudes towards Indigenous people in the 1960s.  This debut novel, which was a book club selection for my Friends’ Book Club, was excellent, and we all enjoyed it. 

And finally, The Dictionary of Lost Words, another debut novel by Australian author Pip Williams, follows main character Esme, daughter of one of the men responsible for writing the Oxford English Dictionary, over four decades as she experiences the writing of the dictionary, the fight for women’s rights, and the First World War.  This historical novel was a selection for my Volunteer Book Club, who met yesterday, and we all loved the book.  Williams included many accurate historical facts and followed the actual timeline of the OED, so we all felt that we learned so much while also enjoying a wonderful reading experience.  I’m not a fan of historical fiction, but this one was amazing!  Who knew that the history of words and the dictionary could be so compelling?!  I would highly recommend this novel to just about anyone. 

WHEW!  That’s all for today.  Hopefully I’ll have more time to write again soon and tell you about more great books.  Take care, stay warm and keep reading! 

Bye for now…

Julie

Quick post on a snowy morning...

It’s snowing this morning, but it won’t stay on the ground for long.  Still, it’s setting the “Christmas season” mood for sure.  I’ve got a hot cup of tea and a bowl of chopped local apples and pears to keep me fueled and warm as I tell you about two book I read recently. 

The first is A Man Downstairs by Canadian author Nicole Lundrigan, which was our November book club selection.  This psychological thriller is set in a small east coast town where Molly Wynters returns with her teenage son to help care for her elderly father, from whom she’s been estranged for the past couple of decades.  Her mother was murdered when she was just three years old, and her testimony helped put a local teen in jail.  When questions of witness reliability came up a few years later, he was released, but killed himself shortly afterward as he suffered terrible guilt over what he’d possibly done.  Molly and her son are renting part of a house from Russ, a man she knew growing up, but she’s not really receiving a warm welcome back to her hometown.  When strange things start happening and she gets anonymous calls telling her to think about the day of her mother’s murder and face the truth, she begins to doubt her own memory.  Can she rely on her memory about the tragic event, or is someone else guilty of the crime?  This was not well-liked by anyone in the group.  We all thought it had too many characters and too many inconsistencies, too many threads left unresolved and too many red herrings.  We thought it was written well enough, but we all struggled to finish and none of us would recommend it.  Too bad, because I’ve read two other books by this author, An Unthinkable Thing and Glass Boys, which were both very good.  Anyway, don’t bother with this one. 

Then I read another fantastic book by Catherine Newman, Wreck, which is the sequel to probably the best book I’ve read this year, Sandwich.  In Wreck, we are reunited with Rocky and her family two years after their last Cape Cod vacation.  This novel begins with the collision of a train and a car, killing the driver of the automobile.  Anxious Rocky learns about this tragedy and discovers that the driver was a young man who went to school with her son, which escalates her anxiety because this proximity reminds her that it could happen to her children too!  She’s also developing a strange rash and must see many different specialists to get a diagnosis.  It all takes place in the fall, which was perfect timing, as it just came out and I read it as soon as I picked it up from the bookstore.  While I thought that Sandwich was a better book, Wreck was also amazing.  It had me laughing out loud while also commiserating with her about the challenges of aging.  I was happy to hear more about their cat, Chicken, too, as well as meet their new kitten, Angie.  I think Sandwich was such a surprise and delight that I set the bar too high and was comparing them as I read Wreck.  I also think that the mystery in the first book, and meeting the characters for the first time, made it a bit better.  Wreck was more of a “slice of life”, which was also delightful, but in a different way. (I think that my view was tainted because I felt there was a bit too much raunch in this follow-up - just my opinion).  One of the authors quoted on the back of the book said something like, “Endorsing a Catherine Newman book is like endorsing puppies or chocolate cake” and I totally agree! Obviously I would highly recommend these books to any woman "of a certain age". 

That’s all for now.  Stay warm and keep reading! 

Bye for now…

Julie

Short post on a Tuesday night...

It’s too bad that it’s so late, because I read two powerhouse books back-to-back that I’d love to tell you about.  Unfortunately I’m not feeling very energetic so late in the evening after a long day at work, so you’ll just get an abbreviated version of the comments I’d really like to make! 

The first book is Endling by Canadian author Maria Reva, which was a showstopper of a book.  The opening chapters focus on Yeva, a woman in her mid-thirties who has fitted out a camper van to serve as a mobile lab.  She tours around Ukraine saving the last snails in various species, the “endlings”, and does her best to appreciate them and/or keep them going for as long as possible.  Her saddest moments are recording the date and time of their passing, which is the date and time of the end of each species.  She funds the maintenance and upkeep of the van by working for a “mail order bride” company run by a Canadian woman who provides opportunities for Western men to travel to Ukraine and go on “romance tours” to meet Ukrainian women.  While Yeva is older than most other “brides”, she does alright.  One day, having worn herself out with her conservation efforts, she allows an unforgivable event to occur and decides to end it all once she’s returned all the remaining endlings to the places where she originally found them.  But before this can happen, she is approached by one of the other, much younger “brides”, Anastasia (Nastia), who asks a favour:  could she use the van for one night?  Although she initially refuses, Yeva is pulled into Nastia’s plan to kidnap 100 of the men from the tour, in retaliation for the 100 brides from (Korea?  Japan? I can't remember) who recently disappeared, and also to draw attention to the whole misogynistic idea of “mail order brides”.  Together, these women, along with Nastia’s older sister Sol, set out on an adventure that will surely save them all, but on the day of the kidnapping, Russia invades Ukraine.  This seems like a straightforward story of women working together and surviving unimaginable events … or at least, this is what we’re led to believe.  But right in the middle of the book comes an unexpected twist that is guaranteed to make any reader sit up and take notice.  I can’t tell you any more, but let’s just say that I wish there was a literary term like “genre-bending” that applied to books that break the fiction/non-fiction barrier.  It was so much more I could tell you about if I had the time and energy, including another narrator, Pasha, a man in his 30s who was born in Ukraine but spent most of his life in Vancouver, encouraged by his parents to quash anything about himself that is not 100% Canadian.  This highly addictive, highly intelligent book delves into so many topics and goes off in so many directions that it is sure to appeal to just about any reader, and I would highly recommend it. 

The next book also has a twist near the middle that I won’t be able to tell you about for fear of ruining the story.  What We Can Know, the latest novel by award-winning British author Ian McEwan, is set in 2119 in a part of Britain that is now a series of islands due to the rising sea levels and a tsunami from which many cities never resurfaced.  The narrator is Tom, an English Literature professor who, along with his colleague Rose, specializes in “90-30”, or literature spanning from 1990-2030, in particular the life and poetry of Francis Blundy, especially the lost poem, “A Corona for Vivien”, written for Blundy’s wife and read aloud as a gift for her at her 54th birthday dinner amongst a houseful of friends.  Tom is determined to find this poem, around which so much speculation, admiration and awe has grown, despite having never again been read.  Although set in the near future, when all the cataclysmic climate crises we’re expecting have already occurred, it feels as though it’s written in the present day, and the time period of Blundy’s dinner and corona delivery, around 2014, is treated as a “golden age”, viewed through the proverbial “rose-coloured glasses” that we often use when thinking of times gone by.  Tom is certain that he can discover where the poem is hidden if only he keeps researching and rereading the letters and documents between and about Vivien and Francis.  When his big break comes, we, along with Tom, are hopeful that he’ll discover the missing poem, but what he finds doesn’t even come close to what he was expecting.  It’s at this point that we are treated to a totally unexpected surprise that I don’t want to reveal, but which perfectly rounds out the novel and solves the mystery.  This book is about… everything.  It’s about the challenges of writing a biography, and asks what we can truly know about a person.  It’s about the climate crisis, and the power of literary works to draw attention to and highlight it.  It’s about love and relationships, literature as a measure of our time and history, and about the often difficult, often solitary lives of writers.  There was so much more to this book, but I can’t really recall anything else right now (while I was reading it, I was saying to myself, on practically every page, “I must remember to include this in my blog, and this, and this, and this…”).  On top of being about "everything", it was also so very well-written, as readers have come to expect from McEwan. I would highly recommend this novel, which I guess is “science fiction” or “speculative fiction” (to use Margaret Atwood’s term), as it’s set nearly a century from now, to anyone who likes literary fiction and literary mysteries.  

That’s all for tonight.  Stay warm and read a good book! 

Bye for now… Julie

Seems like summer...

It’s an unseasonably warm October afternoon, but the breeze is nice and the birdies and squirrellies are busy collecting seeds, so I thought I’d take advantage of this opportunity to write while Riley is busy watching them.  It’ll have to be a quick post, though, as he loses interest in them quickly and then usually wants “mama bonding time” with me.  I have two books to tell you about, both by Chinese Canadian authors. 

The first is called Red Pockets:  a tale of inheritance, ghosts and the future by Alice Mah, Professor of Urban and Environmental Studies.  Following a year of record wildfires, Mah visits her great-grandfather’s rice village in South China as an extension of her research trip to a petrochemical plant where she measures toxic pollution. Her visit coincides with the Qingming Festival, a time when family members sweep the tombs of their ancestors.  Mah doesn’t know if she should sweep the tombs of her ancestors or what exactly she should do to meet the expectations of the villagers - should she give out “red pockets”, red envelopes containing money, or will that set a precedent for future visits?  She worries about the “hungry ghosts”, ancestors whose tombs have been neglected and often cause misfortune.  Her story then moves from China to England, to British Columbia, then to Scotland, where she now teaches at the University of Glasgow.  Throughout her story and locations, though, are several themes, including the desperate state of the climate and the lack of response from industries and governments, feelings of despair and hopelessness, and ultimately ways to cope with eco-anxiety and look forward to some sort of future that is worthy of generations to come.  Depressing?  Yes!  Well-written?  Yes!  Intriguing?  Absolutely!!  It was a small book packed with plenty of big feelings, and made this eco-anxiety-stricken reader feel a bit less alone.  I’d definitely recommend it! 

And my Volunteer Book Club met yesterday to discuss Denison Avenue by Christina Wong and illustrated by Daniel Innes, which was a hit.  Told in the first section by Wong in prose and in the second section by Innes in illustrations, this novel/graphic novel explores grieving, vulnerability and the resilience of the human spirit, told against a backdrop highlighting the gentrification of Toronto’s Chinatown.  Wong Cho Sum, an elderly, childless Chinese-Canadian, suddenly loses her husband in a car accident, and she must cope with this loss and learn to carry on.  Her reliance on her husband makes this difficult, as she never really learned to speak English fluently and she is unprepared for the rapid pace of the changes in the neighbourhoods with which she is familiar.  Over the course of a year, we follow Cho Sum’s gradual trajectory from loneliness and isolation to connection as she meets new people and reconnects with community members, forming new routines and building new relationships, sometimes with the most unlikely people.  This was a great book for discussion, as we could all relate to the facts of isolation of our most vulnerable populations, often seniors, and even more often immigrant seniors.  We all found it difficult to get into the book, but once we passed a certain stage (different for each one of us), we were sucked right in and couldn’t wait to finish.  We all felt for Cho Sum and hoped that her life turned out ok.  We liked the character of Chloe, not often heard about but certainly significant.  This, too, is a book I would highly recommend. 

Riley’s on my lap now so I’m typing with one hand, which means it’s time to sign off.  Happy Fall and Happy Reading! 

Bye for now… Julie

Goodbye summer, hello autumn...

It’s the last day of summer, and it’s certainly still felt like summer these past few weeks, with only the cooler mornings and the changing leaves hinting at the season to come.  I’ve got three books to tell you about, but I also want to get outside and enjoy the day, as we’ve got a couple of days of rain coming, so these entries will be brief. 

The first book is The Believers by Zoe Heller.  I read What Was She Thinking:  notes on a scandal a number of years ago and really enjoyed it, so when I happened to see it on my bookshelf, I thought that surely she’s written other books, too.  The Believers was written after Scandal, but was just as intriguing.  It follows the Litvinoff family, wife Audrey, husband Joel and their three children, daughters Rosa and Karla and adopted son Lenny, after Joel has a heart attack and is in critical condition in a hospital in New York.  Audrey is a reluctant mother at best, and she is critical of everything her daughters do and believe in, but willingly indulges drug-addict Lenny and continues to sing his praises.  Joel and Audrey married after a brief acquaintance when he visited London to speak at a Socialist rally in the 1960s, and after being uprooted to New York, she’s been a devoted supporter of Joel's for 40 years.  So when a woman appears claiming to be his mistress, Audrey is in shock.  How can she not have known this about her husband?  And how can she go on, with the knowledge she now has?  This book was incredibly engaging, and while I didn’t really like any of the characters or condone their actions or attitudes, I felt compelled to get to the end and find out how things got resolved.  I would highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys books dealing with family secrets, especially those told with a side of satire. 

Then I read a book for my Volunteer Book Club, Anthony Horowitz’ Magpie Murders.  I watched the PBS series and really enjoyed it, and I had the book on the shelf but had surprisingly never read it, so I was delighted to pick it up and dive in.  This book tells the story of Susan Ryeland, an editor who is reading the latest in a mystery series featuring fictional detective Atticus Pünd (think Poirot but Greek-German instead of Belgian), but she reaches the end of the manuscript to find that the final chapter is missing.  When she tries to find this missing chapter, she discovers that the author, Alan Conway, has died in much the same way as the main character in the manuscript, also called Magpie Murders.  As Susan tries to discover the truth behind Conway’s death, she begins to spot parallels between fiction and reality, and is drawn deeper and deeper into the mystery until she must back away or risk her own safety.  Oh, and Conway’s entire book is presented within the book, making this one of the cleverest novels I’ve ever read, a true example of meta-fiction.  It was a great hit with the book club members, and would be an excellent choice for any book club. 

And I just finished the book for tomorrow night’s Friends Book Club meeting, Harriet Tubman:  live in concert by Bob the Drag Queen.  This novel tells the unlikely story of Harriet Tubman and her band, the Freemans, and their efforts to record a rap album and go on tour in order to reach young people and tell their story.  A phenomenon called The Return makes it possible for historical figures to return and live among us in the present day, and Harriet reaches out to Darnell, a music producer, to help with this project.  Darnell thinks of Harriet as a Black superhero, and is thrilled and more than a little nervous to take on this project, as he’s been writing advertising jingles for the past 15 years due to some personal crisis years earlier.  This may be the thing that puts him back on the music map, but will he overcome the obstacles he’s facing in order to complete this momentous project?  Can Harriet help to lead him to his own freedom?  You’ll have to read this strange, interesting novel to find out.  It was certainly not something I’d pick up on my own, but was definitely worth reading. 

That’s all for today.  Get outside and enjoy the sunny day! 

Bye for now... Julie