I finished four books since my last reading report.
The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware, Grade: A+: Laura “Lo” Blacklock is a travel writer who goes on a luxury cruise so that she can write a piece about it for the magazine that she works for. Just before she embarks, someone breaks into her flat while she’s still there. The experience leaves her scared and exhausted. She takes meds for anxiety and drinks too much, and now she’s not getting much sleep either. When she witnesses what she believes to be a murder, the passengers and crew can’t help being skeptical. But strange things keep happening, subtle hints that someone on board is trying to cover their tracks, so even though she herself begins to doubt what she saw, she can’t let it go. The wi-fi isn’t working, leaving her cut off from the rest of the world, but we readers are given tantalizing bits of information conveyed through social media posts, e-mail, etc. Based on the reviews, this seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it story. Some readers can’t get past the main character’s flaws. I didn’t have that problem. I felt like I was right there in the story with her, confused and on edge, trying to figure things out. It was gripping. I am looking forward to reading more of Ware’s work, and I have a copy of In a Dark, Dark Wood standing by for when the right mood strikes.
Witch World by Andre Norton, Grade: B+: Ex-soldier Simon Tregarth is being hunted down by professional assassins, and he knows he’s about to die, until a mysterious person offers him a way out: a portal that will take him to a world that is a perfect fit for him. Whisked away by this magic, he ends up in the land of Estcarp, a matriarchal society of witches. Estcarp is just one of several distinct lands in this new world. Most of them seem primitive by comparison to what he knew on Earth, though there are surprising hints of technology that Tregarth can’t account for. And then there are the Kolder, a race so technologically advanced that he thinks they may be aliens. The Kolder are trying to take over the world. Estcarp’s magic and Tregarth’s military skills are the only things standing in their way. I thought that this was an interesting way to blend the genres of fantasy and sci-fi, but I didn’t particularly like the story.
The Curse of the Pharaohs by Elizabeth Peters, Grade: C+: The Curse of the Pharaohs is the second book to feature archeologist/sleuth Amelia Peabody. Though I disliked the first book, I decided to give the series a second chance, and I have to say that the early part of it was promising. Amelia Peabody in a domestic setting–as a mom, wife, and neighbor–is funny and extremely relatable. Then she and her husband leave the kid with family and take themselves off to Egypt to direct an archeological dig that is very Tut-like, complete with a curse. There they both suddenly become nearly insufferable. He’s always blustering and telling her what to do. She’s always ignoring him, getting herself in trouble, and smugly congratulating herself on every little thing. I mentioned their insufferability to my mom, and she told me that that was what she liked about the series. Go figure. I guess there’s a book for every reader and a reader for every book.
The Plentiful Darkness by Heather Kassner, Grade: A-: I pre-ordered The Plentiful Darkness on a whim, because it sounded interesting, and then I promptly forgot about it. So, one day it arrived, as if out of the blue and, because it was short, I read it right away. The setting is a world in which people use magical mirrors to capture moonlight as a power source. The main characters are a girl, who has lost her parents and is struggling to survive on her own, and a sorceress who imprisons children in a place called the Plentiful Darkness. It was a dark story, but hopeful, just the right tone for times like these.