Month: January 2019

  • “In my life…”

    Paul O’Connor returns to Briar Patch Books with a review of a book published in the spring of 2016. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor PAUL MCCARTNEY: THE LIFE. By Philip Norman. Little, Brown and Company. 816 pages. $32. For those Americans of a certain age, The Beatles represent more than music. Although John, Paul and…

  • A little coincidence…

    Bob Moyer keeps trying to catch up on all the books he’s read and intends to review, but there are so many ways to have fun and put off writing. … Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer SHELL GAME. By Sara Paretsky. William Morrow. 385 pages. $27.95 Over the course of 17 novels, she’s been beat…

  • Through a screen, darkly

    From time to time, my younger son, a Navy officer, contributes a review. This one is particularly timely, not to mention thought-provoking. Reviewed by Lt. Samuel Brinson LIKEWAR: The Weaponization of Social Media. By P. W. Singer and Emerson T. Brooking. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 416 pages. $28 Over the last few years, the internet and…

  • Driving out the dark spirits

    Don’t you just love it when a reviewer introduces you to a promising-sounding series with a lot of books in it? Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer DESOLATION MOUNTAIN. By William Kent Krueger. Atria Books. 320 pages. $26 When the mining company moved out of the Iron Lake area, it left behind a ravaged landscape and…

  • A book for those who love books, bookshops and mysteries

    I somehow misplaced this review when Bob Moyer submitted it last fall. He politely nudged me to find and post it.  And now I won’t rest until I have the book. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer THE BOOKSHOP OF YESTERDAYS. By Amy Meyerson. Park Row Books. 364 pages. $32.99. Some books are scary. Not Halloween…

  • Stephanie Plum’s latest adventure is delicious

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson LOOK ALIVE TWENTY-FIVE. By Janet Evanovich. Penguin Audio. 7 hours; 6 CDs. Read by Lorelei King. $32. Also available in print from G.P. Putnam’s Sons. Stephanie Plum, the not-very-intrepid bounty hunter in Trenton, N.J., somehow finds new ways to career more or less unscathed through her zany, dangerous and outrageous…