by Mary Ellis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 2016
A pleasant cozy, more romance than mystery, with inspirational overtones.
A quartet of private detectives has their hands full with cases in two different cities.
Natchez private eye Nate Price and his wife, Isabelle (Midnight on the Mississippi, 2015, etc.), are two years behind on a honeymoon until their friends and colleagues chip in and send them to lovely Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, leaving former police officer Beth Kirby and new hire Michael Preston to hold down the office back in Natchez. Beth had wanted to stay as far away from Natchez as possible after falling in love with her former boss earned her a bad reputation in the department. Although she did nothing wrong, her life was made miserable, and her self-esteem is in the cellar. Michael too is suffering after being dumped just before his wedding, and the two get off to a rough start. Beth’s pastor is suspected of stealing money from the church building fund and killing himself when the loss is discovered. His wife, convinced that he’s innocent, hires the agency to prove it. Michael’s accounting expertise comes in handy while tracking down the missing money, and Beth proves that the pastor was murdered despite resistance from the police and ill-will from her former partner. Meanwhile, the Prices’ honeymoon gets derailed when Isabelle sees her ex-husband, Craig, whose gambling ruined their marriage, in Bay St. Louis. Isabelle calls Craig’s second wife, who’s been devastated since Craig told her he was leaving her, a story both women suspect may be false. Isabelle resolves to find out what Craig’s really doing as Beth and Michael slowly begin to trust each other and try to keep their relationship friendly—no more, no less—after their bad experiences while going all out to solve their case.
A pleasant cozy, more romance than mystery, with inspirational overtones.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7369-6173-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harvest House
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
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by C.S. Lewis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1942
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
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by Heather Morris ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 4, 2018
The writing is merely serviceable, and one can’t help but wish the author had found a way to present her material as...
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An unlikely love story set amid the horrors of a Nazi death camp.
Based on real people and events, this debut novel follows Lale Sokolov, a young Slovakian Jew sent to Auschwitz in 1942. There, he assumes the heinous task of tattooing incoming Jewish prisoners with the dehumanizing numbers their SS captors use to identify them. When the Tätowierer, as he is called, meets fellow prisoner Gita Furman, 17, he is immediately smitten. Eventually, the attraction becomes mutual. Lale proves himself an operator, at once cagey and courageous: As the Tätowierer, he is granted special privileges and manages to smuggle food to starving prisoners. Through female prisoners who catalog the belongings confiscated from fellow inmates, Lale gains access to jewels, which he trades to a pair of local villagers for chocolate, medicine, and other items. Meanwhile, despite overwhelming odds, Lale and Gita are able to meet privately from time to time and become lovers. In 1944, just ahead of the arrival of Russian troops, Lale and Gita separately leave the concentration camp and experience harrowingly close calls. Suffice it to say they both survive. To her credit, the author doesn’t flinch from describing the depravity of the SS in Auschwitz and the unimaginable suffering of their victims—no gauzy evasions here, as in Boy in the Striped Pajamas. She also manages to raise, if not really explore, some trickier issues—the guilt of those Jews, like the tattooist, who survived by doing the Nazis’ bidding, in a sense betraying their fellow Jews; and the complicity of those non-Jews, like the Slovaks in Lale’s hometown, who failed to come to the aid of their beleaguered countrymen.
The writing is merely serviceable, and one can’t help but wish the author had found a way to present her material as nonfiction. Still, this is a powerful, gut-wrenching tale that is hard to shake off.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-279715-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
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