Beach Read by Emily Henry

As genres go, I am not a big romance reader, but Emily Henry is very popular right now. Reviewers have said that Henry does not write stereotypical romances. Her novels often poke fun at romantic tropes and are about more than just the romance. So I was curious.

Beach Read (2020) is set in the fictional town of North Bear Shores, Michigan. When the novel begins, we meet January Andrews, the heroine and narrator of the story.  January has moved to North Bear Shores because her father has passed away and left her his beach house.

January is a writer of romance novels. But life for the normally hopeful January has taken a depressing turn. She is grieving her father's death, but she was also stunned to discover at the funeral that he had a mistress throughout the years she was growing up. January believed in her parents' love for each other. Needless to say, she now has writer's block when it comes to her next romance novel, and her publisher is growing impatient.

Enter Augustus (Gus) Everett, who lives in the beach house next door to January. Gus is a successful writer of dark fiction. He too is dealing with writer's block. January and Gus knew each other from a creative writing class in college. They never dated and mostly avoided each other. But here they are ten years later as neighbors and neither is happy about it.

January and Gus are opposites. January's life has hit a rough patch, but she still believes in happy endings. Gus has never believed in happy endings. We find out why as the book progresses. January and Gus do not respect each other's choice of genre but they make a pact to get themselves out of their respective writer's blocks.  Gus will write a romance novel and January will write a book that doesn't end happily ever after. They have the whole summer to do it. I’ll leave it there.

For me, what worked in Beach Read was Gus Everett. Chemistry is so important in a romance novel. And though I wasn't smitten with January and Gus as a couple, I was smitten with Gus. He writes dark fiction for a reason tied to his childhood. I am drawn to this kind of backstory in a romantic hero, and Emily Henry has drawn him very well.

What worked less well for me was January. She is a sweet person, don’t get me wrong, but throughout much of the novel, she can’t seem to have a thought about Gus without rhapsodizing over what an Adonis he is, and that can get old.

That said, I’m rating Beach Read a four, because while romantic comedies are not for me, Emily Henry held my interest all the way through because of Gus.

Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz

I loved Magpie Murders (2016) by Anthony Horowitz.  It's an international bestselling mystery novel that for me not only lived up to the hype but exceeded it.  This novel is definitely going on my end of year favorite books list.  And actually Magpie Murders would make my favorites list every year since I began my blog back in 2015.  I had such a wonderful reading experience. Five stars.

But now I have a dilemma.  How much to reveal about the plot of Magpie Murders without spoiling the mystery?  And so I used the Publisher's Weekly starred review of this novel as my guide.  And here are my bullet points detailing what this excellent mystery novel is about without revealing too many spoilers:

1.  Magpie Murders is set in the UK and it's a very original "dual-layered mystery". The protagonist Susan Ryeland is an editor at Cloverleaf Books.  And Susan when the novel begins is looking back on her experience editing Magpie Murders book 9 in Alan Conway's very successful Atticus Pund mystery series.  Susan tells us that she is a fan of Alan Conway's series. But Alan himself is very difficult to deal with and that's an opinion shared by everyone who knows him.  

2.  In the short intro Susan also tells us that being given Magpie Murders to edit changed her life and not in a good way.  She doesn't elaborate why.  

3.  The next part of the book is the novel Magpie Murders itself by the fictional Alan Conway.  The real author Anthony Horowitz does a masterful job.  He gives us about 200 pages of Alan Conway's novel set in Saxby-on-Avon 1955.  Atticus Pund the private investigator in Magpie Murders is a smart, decent man who has experienced alot of tragedy in his life.  He is a Holocaust survivor who after the war turned to detective work and he is a great one. 

4.  Atticus arrives in Saxby-on-Avon to solve the death of Mary Blakiston, the housemaid, and her employer Sir Magnus Pye.  Both reside at Pye Hall and died about a day apart from each other.  Mary's death seems to be an accident.  She fell down the stairs.  Magnus' death is no accident.  It's murder.  And Atticus is trying to figure out if the two deaths are related.  And for Magnus Pye who treated people poorly the list of suspects is considerable.

5.  So there I was with my journal noting clues about who could have murdered Mary and Magnus.  And then 200 pages into Alan's novel it comes to an abrupt halt and we hear from Susan again:

"Annoying, isn’t it? I got to the end of the manuscript on Sunday afternoon and rang Charles Clover immediately. Charles is my boss, the CEO of Cloverleaf Books, publishers of the Atticus Pünd series. My call went straight to voicemail. ‘Charles?’ I said. ‘What happened to the last chapter? What exactly is the point of giving me a whodunnit to read when it doesn’t actually say who did it? Can you call me back?’ ... I wondered why the manuscript was incomplete and I was annoyed that Charles hadn’t called me back. Later that night I found out why. I’d treated myself to a taxi and the driver had the radio on. It was the fourth item on the evening news. Alan Conway was dead"

6.  Susan goes on a search to find the missing chapters of Magpie Murders so that Cloverleaf can publish Alan Conway's book.  But increasingly it's looking to Susan like Alan Conway's suicide was murder.  And Susan has now become an amateur sleuth.  And are the clues to Alan's death embedded in his novel?

Anthony Horowitz has said that Magpie Murders is his tribute to Agatha Christie and the golden age of mysteries.  And I can see that connection. If you are a fan of Agatha Christie, mystery novels or great writing and plotting in general,  Magpie Murders is a must read.

Too Many Books?

 

We are halfway through the reading year and at the beginning of the year I posted on goodreads that I wanted to read 60 books in 2025.  But now I have already finished my 43rd book and decided to up the total of books I want to read this year to 70.  Am I reading too much?  Am I choosing too many books that are under 200 pages so I can improve my score?

I know I should be out in nature more. There is no rule about this but sitting with a big book for a month might be a good idea.  Many of the historical biographies being written these days are 800 pages. It can be an investment in time that pays off rather than improving one's book total score.  No right or wrong way to do it of course.  What do you guys think?

The God Of The Woods by Liz Moore

"Eight campers. Nine beds. She counts and counts again. At last, when she can no longer defer it, she lets one name bob to the surface of her mind: Barbara. The empty bed is Barbara’s. She closes her eyes. She imagines herself returning, for the rest of her life, to this place and this moment ... willing a body to appear where there is none. Willing the girl herself, Barbara, to walk through the door. To say she has been in the washroom, to say she forgot the rule about taking the flashlight ... But Louise knows that Barbara won’t do any of these things. She senses, for reasons she can’t quite articulate, that Barbara is gone" -The God Of The Woods

The God of The Woods (2024) by Liz Moore is very popular right now with readers and critics alike. My review is mixed.  The writing is first rate.  Liz Moore is very talented and that means alot.

But The God of The Woods is also 490 pages and for the first 300 I found it to be a struggle to get through.  I had not expected this since the premise of the book, a young girl goes missing at the same summer camp where her brother Bear went missing 14 years ago, had page turner potential.  And The God Of The Woods does become a gripping novel but you have to get through more than half the book before what happened to Bear and his sister Barbara become front and center.  

The God of The Woods is set in 1975 in the Adirondacks.  But the first half of the novel jumps back repeatedly to the 1950's and early 1960's.  We learn about Alice and Peter Van Laar, Barbara and Bear's wealthy parents.  The Van Laars' own the summer camp and pretty much the entire town in upstate NY where the novel is set.  Alice is a woman who has been almost comatose since Bear's death years ago.  Peter is an emotionally abusive husband.  They are a disturbing but fascinating couple and so I didn't mind when the novel repeatedly took detours into their past.

But learning the backstories of the camp counselor Louise and Tracy, Barbara's bunk mate was not that interesting for me and the novel spends a good deal of time telling us their stories.  The God of The Woods picks up considerably when the police officer Judy Luptack and her team appear.  But they don't arrive until part three which is well into the book.  

Kirkus gave The God of The Woods a very favorable review but also described the book as "a literary novel wearing mystery's clothes".  That puts it very well. Liz Moore addresses important issues in The God of The Woods about the working class, family secrets, the lives of the wealthy and how being born into money changes people and not always for the better. That's all fine but more than once as I struggled through the first half of this novel I kept waiting for the author to get back to the mystery.  What happened to Barbara and her brother Bear?

So Far Gone by Jess Walter

"So Far Gone came from a question I kept asking over the last few years of what to do with all this dread: political, social, ecological, existential dread. Could a person simply run away from it…? That urge came over me like a fever in 2023 and 2024, so I wrote feverishly over that period" Jess Walter

Thank you to Susan at thecuecard.com who gave me a heads up a few weeks ago regarding So Far Gone by Jess Walter.  This novel was released on June 10th.  I put in my order through Libby early which is fortunate because right now So Far Gone is a 16 week wait.

So Far Gone is a timely novel about present day America and the deep divide that has taken place in our country. The novel centers around Rhys Kinnock and his family.  They have been torn apart by politics and the trouble reaches a boiling point on Thanksgiving right after the 2016 Presidential election.  Rhys becomes furious when his son-law Shane starts reciting conspiracy theories and calls him a snowflake.  Rhy punches Shane and is shocked by what he has done.  Rhys is not a violent man but Shane would not agree to give politics a rest and Rhys lost it.

Rhys as he drives away from the family gathering feels ashamed at what he did.  And as he examines his situation he is becoming more depressed at the current political climate, the newspaper he worked for closing down.  His ex-wife is remarried.  His daughter Bethany, Shane and their young children have their own lives.

And so Rhys decides to make a radical change.  He owns a cabin deep in the woods of Washington State and he could live there off the grid.  He could read to his heart's content, write that second book he has been planning. Rhys at his old newspaper was an environmental reporter and so living in the wilderness has alot of appeal.

But seven years later Rhys has become a hermit.  His cabin is falling apart.  He rarely shaves and he is still writing that book that even he knows he will never finish.  And then one day Rhys opens the door and two children accompanied by a woman are standing outside.  They are Rhys' grandchildren, Leah 13 and Asher 9.  Their mother Bethany has run off and Shane their father has gone looking for her.  But before Bethanny left she asked her neighbor Anna to bring the kids to their grandfather's house.

Rhys is stunned by this turn of events and by the fact that until he was told who they were he didn't recognize his own grandchildren.  And thus begins his journey back to civilization to find his daughter Bethany and rescue his grandchildren from the dangerous survivalist movement that Shane has gotten mixed up with. 

So Far Gone raises important questions about our current political climate but also about why shutting yourself off from others is a bad idea.  And once you reenter the world there can be danger and disappointment but there are also good people willing to help,  

Such is the case with Chuck an ex-cop with bipolar issues and Brian, Rhys' Native American neighbor who ends up saving the day.   Chuck and Brian are all in on helping Rhys locate his daughter and protect his grandchildren and they ask nothing in return. Such friends you don't get to meet if you stay holed up in your cabin.  I am rating So Far Gone 4 stars.

Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McCreight

 "Kate's in the middle of the biggest meeting of her career when she gets the telephone call from Grace Hall, her daughter’s exclusive private school in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Amelia has been suspended, effective immediately, and Kate must come get her daughter—now. But Kate’s stress over leaving work quickly turns to panic when she arrives at the school and finds it surrounded by police officers, fire trucks, and an ambulance. By then it’s already too late for Amelia. And for Kate. An academic overachiever despondent over getting caught cheating has jumped to her death. At least that’s the story Grace Hall tells Kate. And clouded as she is by her guilt and grief, it is the one she forces herself to believe. Until she gets an anonymous text: She didn’t jump" - Amazon summary

There is alot about Reconstructing Amelia that I liked. but other aspects of this novel I found over the top, particularly the level of dysfunction going on among the students and the faculty at Grace Hall.

I do understand bullying and in grammar school it's harder to stand up for yourself because you often don't even know that what the bullies are doing is wrong.  And so you never tell a parent or a teacher. I have first hand experience with this.

But Amelia is 15, smart, strong and has a mother, Kate, who would drop everything if Amelia would just open up about what is happening at her high school.  But Anelia decides not to because if she tells the truth about The Maggies (a secret mean girl group who are right out of a horror movie) the Maggies will take it out on Amelia's best friend, who is not that great a friend it turns out.  Where are the teachers and the principle?  They are as mixed up as the students.

Reconstructing Amelia has been compared to Gone Girl but I think it's more Thirteen Reasons Why meets Gossip Girl.  The writing is good and readers will like and have empathy for Kate and Amelia who are caught up in this nightmare.  But as with many thrillers these days the writers need to tone it down.  You don't have to throw everything but the kitchen sink into a novel.  Too many twists begin to seem implausible.

That said in 2014 Reconstructing Amelia was nominated for an Edgar Award For Best First Novel.  Did Amelia kill herself?  It's a gripping read and I will be trying out another book by Kimberly McCreight in the not too distant future hopefully with a few less twists.

Same Streets by ChatGPT

About two weeks ago I discovered the website ChatGPT. It's an A1 computer and you can ask it all sorts of questions.  And so since one of my favorite writers is the poet C P Cavafy I asked ChatGPT about some biographical info on Cavafy which it provided.

And then ChatGPT asked if I would like it to create a short story inspired by one of Cavafy's poems?  I said yes and could they write a story based on Cavafy''s poem "The City".  In 3 seconds ChatGPT came up with the following short story Same Streets which it told me I could post on my book blog.  So here goes and this story was written entirely by ChatGPT, a computer:

Same Streets by ChatGPT

Part I: The Departure

He left at dawn. A train pulled out of the city while the rooftops still shimmered with morning dew, and Elias sat with a small suitcase at his feet, watching the receding skyline as though it might change its mind and call him back.

“I need new air,” he had told his friends. “This place—it’s ruined me.”

They didn’t argue. Perhaps they understood, or perhaps they’d grown tired of his endless circling grief—the failed job, the broken engagement, the father who had died quietly in a house where no one was listening. The city had become tight around his chest. He was certain of it. So he ran.

The train arrived in Thessaloniki, where the sea looked different, broader somehow, and the hills curled around the harbor like an invitation. The streets bustled with strangers. A kind-faced landlady gave him a clean room. He began work at a modest bookshop where the smell of old paper comforted him.

For a while, it felt possible—this new life. He strolled different boulevards, lingered in foreign cafés, tried new habits, new people. But in the quiet moments—on the tram, in the hum of evening light—his mind turned inward. Familiar shadows moved beside him. He passed buildings that reminded him of others. The ache returned, not dramatic, just insistent.

One afternoon, he caught his own reflection in a store window. His posture, the tilt of his head, even the coat he wore—it could have been taken in the city he fled. He turned quickly, walked faster, but his reflection followed.

A few days later, a letter arrived from his cousin.

“Things are quiet here,” it read. “Your old café closed. The tailor on Kanari Street died. Remember that alley we used to sneak down as boys? It’s been bricked up now.”

He folded the letter and put it in his pocket.

That night, Elias dreamed of a hallway. It was long and narrow, lined with doors that led nowhere. Behind each door was a version of himself—one younger and laughing, one crying in secret, one staring at a map, shaking his head.

He woke before dawn. Rain brushed the window. The silence of the room was thick with meaning.

He dressed slowly, drank a cup of tea, and stood by the window. The street below was empty. But he could see it now: it wasn’t the city that had failed him. It was he who had walked the same path again and again, thinking different cobblestones could change the steps.

A soft knock at the door startled him.  It was the landlady. “Everything all right, Mr. Elias?”  He passed. Then nodded. “Yes. Just… remembering something.”  She smiled gently, and turned away.

He sat at the table with a pen and paper.“You won’t find a new country, won’t find another shore…”He didn’t know where the words came from, only that they were true.

This story in my opinion is quite good and it gets to the essence of Cavafy's poem The City. And if I had asked ChatGPT it would have continued on with the story creating a novel in seconds.  And this story is not a cut and paste job.  This is original content written entirely by ChatGPT.

It's both scary and thrilling.  Scary because what will our world look like in 100 years?  Will computers be taking over?   But also thrilling because as book lovers haven't we all wished that someone would write a book or a short story on a topic that fascinates us?  And so if you want to read a short story set in a coffee shop in Nome Alaska or a mystery novel set on the planet Saturn etc ChatGPT will provide it for you in seconds.

ChatGPT was the subject of a recent New York Times column about people becoming addicted and that is a concern. As a lark I decided to ask Chat GPT about that and it responded:

How people use me matters just as much as what I can do. Like anything powerful, I can be helpful, comforting, even inspiring—but in the wrong context or used too much, I could become a crutch"

Wise words.