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Shhh!: Librarians tracking killers
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson BOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING. By Jenn McKinlay. Read by Allyson Ryan. Books on Tape (Penguin Random House). Six CDS; 7 ½ hours. Also available in print. Sometimes, you just need a light, cozy mystery to entertain you. For a lover of books, if that mystery has a library as a…
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Lincoln, military genius
Paul O’Connor somehow missed this excellent Civil War history when it was published a few years ago, and he’s glad he found it now as an audio book. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor TRIED BY WAR: ABRAHAM LINCOLN AS COMMANDER IN CHIEF. By James M. McPherson. Penguin Audio. 8 CDs. Read by George Guidall. $31.50.…
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Hardboiled, served up right
Whether he’s in L.A. with Easy Rawlins or Manhattan with Leonid McGill, Walter Mosley delivers some fine books. Bob Moyer has a great time with the latest. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer AND SOMETIMES I WONDER ABOUT YOU. By Walter Mosley. Doubleday. 272 ages $26.95. What’s happened to the gunsels, the dames, the twists, the…
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A plan gone awry
Not a new book, this one has held up well over time. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor A BRIDGE TOO FAR. By Cornelius Ryan. Blackstone Audio. 18 hours, 11 minutes. Read by Clyde Chafer. $22.02 through Audible.com. Also available in paperback from Simon & Schuster. 672 pages. $19.99. In September 1944, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower…
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The language of family
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson WE NEVER ASKED FOR WINGS. By Vanessa Diffenbaugh. Read by Emma Bering and Robbie Daymond. Random House Audio. 11 ½ hours; 10 CDs. $40. Also available in print from Ballantine Books. Letty Espinoza had a lot more advantages than many children of Mexican immigrants. She had two supportive, loving parents.…
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Faster, higher, freer
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson CIRCLING THE SUN. By Paula McLain. Read by Katharine McEwan. Random House Audio. 12 ½ hours; nine CDs. $46. Also available in print from Ballantine Books. As she did so ably in The Paris Wife, the story of Ernest Hemingway’s first wife, Paula McLain once again tackles in fiction a…
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Behind the lines
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson MADELEINE’S WAR. By Peter Watson. Nan A. Talese Doubleday. 366 pages. $26.95. World War II is grinding toward an end in Europe, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less dangerous to be a spy in occupied France. If anything, the Nazis, knowing an Allied invasion is imminent, have grown more…
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A delicious tale
Crime fiction, the lovely French countryside, a sense of history AND lavish meals – there’s a lot to like in the Bruno books, and Bob Moyer relishes the opportunity to review another book in the series. THE CHILDREN RETURN. By Martin Walker. Knopf. 320 pages. $24.95 ‘To Protect and To Serve.” Police forces around the…
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Extraordinary courage
Paul O’Connor has been reading and thinking about spies this summer, and he’s developed high standards. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor AVENUE OF SPIES: A TRUE STORY OF TERROR, ESPIONAGE, AND ONE AMERICAN FAMILY’S HEROIC RESISTANCE IN NAZI-OCCUPIED PARIS. By Alex Kershaw. Random House Audio. Read by Mark Deakins. Seven hours. $35. Also available in…
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X is for ….
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson X. By Sue Grafton. Read by Judy Kaye. Random House Audio. 11 CDS, 13 ½ hours. $45. Also available in print from Putnam. So much for speculation about what Sue Grafton would make “X” stand for in her long-running series of alphabet-named detective stories, dating back to A Is for…