Fiction – Ring Reads

‘Hollow’ Full of Twists and Wise Restraint

Sullivan threads several tricky needles well in Brimstone Hollow, and that restraint helps her plot and characters shine.

‘Under the Falls’ Sticks to the Shallows

The cover to Richard Russo's Under the Falls has the author and title superimposed on an overhead photograph of a teenage boy in blue swim trunks diving backwards into water from a rocky bluff while other teens, also in swimming gear, crouch nearby.

Under the Falls sets up complex relationships, old hurts, clashing motivations, and a town full of secrets but doesn’t give them time to live up to the potential that’s well within Richard Russo’s wheelhouse.

‘Plant Lady’ Has Fun With Revenge

The cover of Plant Lady, featuring an illustration of a young woman with dark hair and wearing a green gardening apron over her white shirt and gray pants. She stands beside a shelf of plants and the title. She is holding a pair of scissors that are dripping blood onto her yellow boots.

There’s a lot to love about Plant Lady, not least of which is the tempered delight the book takes with its kills, but the straightforward fun means missed opportunity for deeper exploration of complex subject matter.

‘Rachel West’ a Starstruck Mystery

The cover of Rachel West and the Fallen Starlet by Emma Mills, featuring a hot-pink flip phone against a bright blue background. The phone has skull and ribbon-bow charms.

Rachel West is a rare murder mystery that holds interest but doesn’t demand a reader’s heart rate spike as they fly through pages.

‘Japanese Gothic’ Bloody and Tender

The cover of Japanese Gothic, featuring a Japanese-style watercolor of a house surrounded by foliage, all in dripping black and red.

Baker’s pacing is quick enough, and the story compelling enough to keep the violence and characters’ hopelessness from bleeding too heavily into the reader.

‘Yesteryear’ Delves into Tradwife Life

The cover of Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke, featuring a collection of farm buildings with a foreground of rolling golden hills. A golden and blue sky stretches overhead.

In delving into her main character’s psyche, Caro Claire Burke walks a fine line between psychological exploration and parody, but manages that balance well.

‘Only One’ a Swift and Sharp Thriller

The cover for The Only One Who Knows by Lisa M. Matlin. A stylized illustration of a pink house and lighthouse upon a thin beach of yellow sand and before a teal ocean make up the bulk of the cover. In the water is a dark triangular shark fin. On the beach is the silhouette of a woman. The title and author are superimposed over the image in sans-serif font.

It can be daunting to let characters be messy, especially those whose eyes we borrow to experience the story, but Matlin does so with confidence.

‘Blood Relay’ a Thriller Built Around Dark Truths

The cover of Blood Relay by Devon Mihesuah, featuring illustrations of galloping horses and riders at the bottom against a long arc of red cut through with a line of white. Upon looking at the cover as a whole, the white becomes a long braid going down the back of a red dress or cloak worn by what appears to be an Indigenous woman. The title is superimposed in black sans-serif font.

None of the issues that Mihesuah incorporates into the story are done so subtly. Then again, none of these issues is exactly cutting edge; they’ve been ignored, dismissed, shrugged off for years, decades, over a century. Maybe what they need isn’t subtlety, but to be shouted from the rooftops.

Sherlock More Than a Role in ‘Final Problem’

The cover of The Final Problem, featuring a bold blue background reminiscent of the 1960s, with an illustration in white and red of a striped lounge chair on a balcony with a fedora, towel, and puddle of dripping blood on the railing.

In glamorous 1960 Europe, a chance encounter between those on both sides of the second world war, and Hollywood’s golden-age camera, makes for a deadly combination. That’s the setup in The Final Problem, the latest from Spanish writer Arturo Perez-Reverte, now translated into English by Frances Riddle. Ormond Basil, a one-time movie star now flirting withContinue reading “Sherlock More Than a Role in ‘Final Problem’”

Emotion and Mystery Threaded Through ‘Mothering’

The cover to Mass Mothering, featuring two circles, one blue and the other dark gray, stacked vertically against a tan background. The blue circle has a faint image of city buildings, while stylized hills are in the gray circle. Black birds and white birds fly across the blue and gray circles, respectively. The title and author name, respectively are on top of these images, as well.

In any book that’s made up of multiple parts, there’s always a risk of one being more compelling than the other, or for the relationship between the two to be confusing before the intended connection is clear. Those questions are central to the tension in Mass Mothering, the latest novel from Sarah Bruni.