There are two regular posts I write that mark the passage of time: monthly capsule wardrobes and my quarterly book reviews…. and it’s hard to grasp the fact that the 3rd quarter of the year has closed and we’re officially into the last three months.
Given that, I’m rounding up the books I read over the last 3 months. I didn’t read as much as I usually do this time of the year, but I chalk that up to the “back-to-school-and-sports” routines that made the evenings a bit more jam packed than in past seasons.
And while I love sitting by the pool and reading a good book, I also love curling up by the fireplace… so here’s to hoping there are some gripping books in my near future to close out my year.
So if you’re looking for a good book, I hope this round-up can help you!
And with that, I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend ahead!
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1. THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE: I can’t say enough amazing things about this book. It came highly recommended to me by someone on instagram, and I brought it along with me to read on our long haul Europe flight this summer… and it didn’t disappoint. I absolutely loved it and it was one of my favorite books of the year so far. It explores so many female dynamics and goes between past and present tense. Including a brief synopsis below:
“Sara Marsala barely knows who she is anymore after the failure of her business and marriage. On top of that, her beloved great-aunt Rosie passes away, leaving Sara bereft with grief. But Aunt Rosie’s death also opens an escape from her life and a window into the past by way of a plane ticket to Sicily, a deed to a possibly valuable plot of land, and a bombshell family secret. Rosie believes Sara’s great-grandmother Serafina, the family matriarch who was left behind while her husband worked in America, didn’t die of illness as family lore has it . . . she was murdered.
Thus begins a twist-filled adventure that takes Sara all over the picturesque Italian countryside as she races to solve a mystery and learn the story of Serafina—a feisty and headstrong young woman in the early 1900s thrust into motherhood in her teens, who fought for a better life not just for herself but for all the women of her small village. Unsurprisingly the more she challenges the status quo, the more she finds herself in danger.
As Sara discovers more about Serafina, she also realizes she is coming head-to-head with the same menacing forces that took down her great-grandmother. At once an immersive multigenerational mystery and an ode to the undaunted heroism of everyday women.“
2. THE SECRET OF VILLA ALBA: After finishing the Sicilian Inheritance I was craving something similar, and this one popped up as a recommended read on Amazon. It had good reviews so I decided to give it a change. And, wow. I loved it. Filled with mystery and love, it’s beautifully written and explores so many themes and dynamics. A very very close second (if not tied) as a favorite from this last quarter (if not the year)….
1968, Sicily. Just months after a terrible earthquake has destroyed the mountain town of Gibellina, Enzo and his wife Irene Borgata are making their way back to the family home, Villa Alba, on roads overlooked by the eerie backdrop of the flattened ghost town. When their car breaks down, Enzo leaves his young wife to go and get help, but when he returns there is no trace of Irene. No body, no sign of a struggle, nothing.
2003. TV showman and true crime aficionado Milo Conti is Italy’s darling, uncovering and solving historic crimes for his legion of fans. When he turns his attention to the story of the missing Irene Borgata, accusing her husband of her murder, Enzo’s daughter Maddi asks her childhood friend, retired detective April Cobain, for help to prove her father’s innocence. But the tale April discovers is murky: mafia meetings, infidelity, mistaken identity, grief and unshakable love. As the world slowly closes in on the claustrophobic Villa Alba, and the house begins to reveal its secrets, will the Borgata family wish they’d never asked April to investigate? And what did happen to Enzo’s missing wife Irene?
3. THE WHISPERS: If you liked The Push, then this is another good one by the same author. It’s definitely twisted, but I found the dynamics and relationships it explores to be fascinating. I thought the characters were well developed that you were able to either like/dislike them, which always helps me to get more engaged with a book.
“On Harlow Street, the well-to-do neighborhood couples and their children gather for a catered barbecue as the summer winds down; drinks continue late into the night.
Everything is fabulous until the picture-perfect hostess explodes in fury because her son disobeys her. Everyone at the party hears her exquisite veneer crack—loud and clear. Before long, that same young boy falls from his bedside window in the middle of the night. And then, his mother can only sit by her son’s hospital bed, where she refuses to speak to anyone, and his life hangs in the balance.
What happens next, over the course of a tense three days, as each of these women grapple with what led to that terrible night?
Exploring envy, women’s friendships, desire, and the intuitions that we silence.”
4. BREAKING THE DARK: I’ve never met a Lisa Jewell book I didn’t love, but this one put an end to the streak. I didn’t not like it, I just didn’t love it. It wasn’t like her other psychological thrillers, and seems to be a new venture she is embarking on… a mystery trilogy. I’m not a sci-fi lover, and this one felt very much so (if you enjoy that, this book might be for you)… and while there was still an engaging storyline and mystery to the plot, it just wasn’t believable (at all). Sharing a bit about it below:
“Meet Jessica Jones: Retired super hero, private investigator, loner. She tried her best to be a shiny spandex crimefighter, but that life only led to unspeakable trauma. Now she avoids that world altogether and works on surviving day-to-day in Hell’s Kitchen, New York.
The morning a distraught mother comes into her office, Jessica would prefer to nurse her hangover and try to forget last night’s poor choices. But something about Amber Randall’s story strikes a chord with her. Amber is adamant that something happened to her teenage twins while they were visiting their father in the UK. The twins don’t act like themselves, and they now have flawless skin, have lost their distinctive tics and habits, and keep talking about a girl named Belle. Amber insists her children have been replaced by something horrible, something “perfect.”
Traveling to a small village in the British countryside, Jessica meets the mysterious Belle, who lives a curiously isolated life in an old farmhouse with a strange woman who claims to be her guardian. Can this unworldly teenager really be responsible for the Randall twins’ new personas? Why does the strange little village of Barton Wallop seem to harbor dark energies and mysteries in its tight-knit community?
A mother’s intuition is never wrong. And Jessica knows that nothing in life is perfect—not these kids, not her on-again, off-again relationship with Luke Cage, and certainly not Jessica herself. But even as she tries to buy into the idea that better days are ahead, Jessica Jones has seen all too clearly that behind every promise of perfection trails a dark, dangerous shadow.“
5. A FLICKER IN THE DARK: I can’t remember how I stumbled across this book, but it had great reviews and sounded intriguing (like a true psychological thriller) so I decided it would be a good option. I’m mixed. On one level, it fit the true definition of a psychological thriller (point in that category), but a quarter of the way through the book I had two different outcomes already pinned and one of the two was correct (loss of a point)…. and I love being shocked at the end. Despite that, I do think the book explored some interesting parental dynamics and that theme played out pretty heavily. Botton line, I enjoyed the book, I just would have preferred to have not had the ending somewhat figured out so early….
“When Chloe Davis was twelve, six teenage girls went missing in her small Louisiana town. By the end of the summer, her own father had confessed to the crimes and was put away for life, leaving Chloe and the rest of her family to grapple with the truth and try to move forward while dealing with the aftermath.
Now twenty years later, Chloe is a psychologist in Baton Rouge and getting ready for her wedding. While she finally has a fragile grasp on the happiness she’s worked so hard to achieve, she sometimes feels as out of control of her own life as the troubled teens who are her patients. So when a local teenage girl goes missing, and then another, that terrifying summer comes crashing back. Is she paranoid, seeing parallels from her past that aren’t actually there, or for the second time in her life, is Chloe about to unmask a killer?“
