Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #311
by muffy
When it comes to thrillers, I am a hard one to please. But Chris Morgan Jones's debut The Silent Oligarch * * * really hits the mark.
First published in Britain as An Agent of Deceit, this financial puzzler zigzags across datelines, geography and glittery lifestyles, global politics and ruthless business schemes, base instincts and noble courage as an intelligence agent pursues a money launderer to expose the dealings of a shadowy Russian oligarch.
It is not clear how a minor government bureaucrat like Konstantin Malin could control half of Russia's oil industry, command a vast fortune and absolute fear from those he deals with, including Richard Lock, a hapless money launderer bound to Malin by marriage, complacency, and greed. Benjamin Webster intends to find out.
A journalist turned corporate espionage investigator, Webster is hired by a swindled financier to ruin Malin. A more personal motivation might be to settle the score for the gruesome death of a colleague years ago in a remote Kazakh jail.
As Webster's investigation closes in on Malin's game and Lock's colleagues begin dying mysteriously, he goes on the run.
"With a mysterious, complex plot and terrific local color, this novel resonates to the pounding heartbeats of the boldly drawn main characters. John Le Carre, Martin Cruz Smith, and Brent Ghelfi will be inching over in the book display so readers in search of erudite, elegant international intrigue can spot the newcomer."
~ "smart first novel, a taut thriller"
* * * = Starred reviews
Blog Post
Winners in Genre Fiction - RUSA’s 2012 Reading List
by muffy
The American Library Association's Reading List Council have selected their top picks for 2012 in eight popular genres. Among the winners (and the shortlists) are some of the best by first-time novelists.
ADRENALINE
Before I Go To Sleep by S. J. Watson. (See FFF blog)
Each morning, Christine wakes with no memory. From the clues she left herself, she tries to piece together her identity and sort lies from the truth. The unrelenting pace thrusts the reader into the confusion of a waking nightmare in which revelations of her past lead to a frantic crescendo.
FANTASY
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (See FFF blog)
Le Cirque des Rêves is utterly unique, disappearing at dawn in one town only to mysteriously reappear in another. At the heart of the circus are two young magicians, involved in a competition neither completely understands. The dreamlike atmosphere and vivid imagery make this fantasy unforgettable.
HISTORICAL FICTION
Doc by Mary Doria Russell
In the early days of Dodge City, a genteel, tubercular Southern dentist forges a friendship with the infamous Earp brothers. Combining historical details and lyrical language, this gritty psychological portrait of gunslinger Doc Holliday reveals how the man became the legend.
HORROR
The Ridge by Michael Koryta
The unexplained death of an eccentric lighthouse keeper in the isolated Kentucky woods, followed by a mysterious threat to a nearby large cat sanctuary prompt an investigation by a journalist and the local sheriff. Palpable evil and a sense of dread drive this chilling tale.
MYSTERY
The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino (See FFF blog)
An introverted mathematician matches wits with a brilliant former colleague to protect the neighbor he secretly adores from a murder charge. Although the reader knows the murderer’s identity from the beginning, this unconventional Japanese mystery remains a taut psychological puzzle.
ROMANCE
Silk is for Seduction by Loretta Chase
Ambitious dressmaker Marcelline Noirot will do almost anything to secure the patronage of the Duke of Clevendon’s intended bride. Neither her calculated business plan nor his campaign of seduction can withstand the force of their mutual attraction. Witty banter and strong-willed characters make this a memorable tale.
SCIENCE FICTION
Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey
The missions of a jaded cop and a dedicated ice hauler officer collide as the fate of humanity hangs in the balance. A mystery adds a noir touch to this space opera featuring deeply flawed yet heroic characters, non-stop action and Earth versus Mars politics.
WOMEN'S FICTION
The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh (See FFF blog)
A former foster child struggles to overcome a past filled with abuse, neglect and anger. Communication through the Victorian language of flowers allows her to discover hope, redemption and a capacity for love. Damaged, authentic characters create an emotional tension in this profoundly moving story.
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #310
by muffy
Ann Holt (website) is no stranger to Norwegian crime fiction enthusiasts, but now, she will reach new readers with a series featuring Norwegian retired police inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen.
This cozy series opens with 1222 * (translated by Marlaine Delargy) when Train no. 601 from Oslo to Bergen derails on the icy tracks during a massive blizzard 1,222 meters above sea level. The driver is killed but luckily the 269 passengers survive and find shelter nearby in an once-grand hotel that is virtually empty, except for a small crew of resourceful staff. With an unexpectedly bountiful supply of food and drinks, the passengers settle in agreeably until one after another, someone turns up dead.
Confined to a wheelchair, retired police inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen (with a solidly related backstory) finds herself slowly being coaxed back into her old habits as curiosity and talent for observation force her to take an interest in the passengers and their secrets. Most intriguing is the presence of a mysterious rail car attached to the back of the train and the rumors of the royal family on board.
"A skillful riff on Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, ...Holt creatively combines the classic locked-room murder police procedural and the Scandinavian thriller in this "frigidly good whodunit."
* = starred review
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #309
by muffy
Actor/playwright/filmmaker Ayad Akhtar is now a first-time novelist with the publication of American Dervish * last week. With rights sold to 19 countries, this might just be the first Muslim-American novel to reach commercial mainstream.
"(B)rilliantly written, nuanced, and emotionally forceful look inside the interplay of religion and modern life", the novel opens with Hayat Shah, heavy with guilt, remembering his first love, Auntie Mina - independent, beautiful and intelligent, and his mother's oldest friend from Pakistan. Her arrival enlivens their previously dour and secular household with laughter and she brings an abiding Muslim faith which she begins to share with Hayat, awakening in the 10 yr.old boy a fierce infatuation, and a new religious identity.
When Mina falls for his father's Jewish colleague Nathan, Hayat feels betrayed. A reckless scheme to set things right brings on devastating consequences for all those he loves most.
"The young teen's personal story about growing up in pre-9/11 Muslim America is both particular and universal, with intense connections of faith, sorrow, tenderness, anger, betrayal, questioning, and love."
A readalike for Leila Aboulela's The Translator (2006) and Hisham Matar's Anatomy of a Disappearance (in audio), (2011).
Ayad Akhtar is an American-born, first generation Pakistani-American from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. An award-winning playwright (Brown, Columbia) he starred and co-wrote The War Within (2005), which was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay and an International Press Academy Satellite Award for Best Picture - Drama.
* = starred review
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #308
by muffy
Adam and Evelyn (translated from the German by John E. Woods), the first novel by German prize-winning author Ingo Schulze is a wonderfully light and humorous novel set during the tumultuous events of 1989 with German Reunification. (Note to reader: An earlier work by this author entitled Simple Stories (2000), somehow referred to as a "novel" in the subtitle was in fact, a collection of 29 interrelated stories.)
Rumors and frenzy reverberate throughout East Germany once Hungary opens its border in May, causing a mad exodus of thousands to the West. For Adam, a talented dressmaker and amateur photographer, life is idyllic at his country home until the steamy August afternoon when his girlfriend Evelyn returns home unexpectedly to find him undressing one of his matronly customers.
Evelyn promptly packs up and runs off to Hungary with Simone and Michael, Simone's West German cousin. In hot pursuit in a vintage Wartburg 311 is Adam, banishing himself from his Garden of Eden in order to win back Evelyn. Thus begins a madcap romantic caper involving a turtle, human trafficking, misadventures, high drama and messy emotions.
"Like Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), this novel shows the difficulty of living with and loving another while squirming under the thumb of an all-powerful state, ...reveals how world-changing events play out at the domestic level and offers a thoughtful meditation on temptation, expulsion, and what constitutes home."
Ingo Schulze was born in Dresden. His first book, 33 Moments of Happiness: St. Petersburg stories won two prestigious German literary awards. In 2007 he was awarded both the Leipzig Book Fair Prize and the Thuringia Literature Prize.
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #307: Spotlight on Korea
by muffy
Please Look After Mom a novel by Kyung-sook S(h)in (translated from the Korean by Chi-Young Kim) is the stunning, deeply moving story of a family’s search for their mother, who goes missing one afternoon amid the crowds of the Seoul Station subway.
Currently a visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York City and one of South Korea’s most widely read and acclaimed novelists, Sin has been honored with many literary prizes including France’s Prix de l’Inaperçu. Please Look After Mom is her first book to appear in English.
Chosen as one of the 9 Kirkus Reviews' New and Notable Fiction Debuts for 2011, Chicago author Samuel Park's This Burns My Heart is narrated by Soo-Ja, a woman struggling to provide a good life for her daughter in spite of her own unhappy marriage and a culture that grants no rights to women, the situation made even more difficult when her long-lost true love Dr. Yul returns.
Considered by critics and reviewers to be his break-out work, The Orphan Master's Son * * * by Adam Johnson (Stanford, Creative Writing) is not to be missed. I am sure some of you would not hesitate to point out that this is NOT his first novel. But how many of you had read Parasites Like Us (2003)? I thought so.
Pak Jun Do's father runs Long Tomorrows, a North Korean work camp for orphans where he is given his first taste of power. Recognized for his loyalty and keen instincts, he rises through the ranks to become a valuable instrument of the state as a professional kidnapper. To stay alive, he must navigate and endure the shifting rules, arbitrary violence, and baffling demands from those in command, until he boldly takes on a treacherous role in order to save the woman he loves.
"Part breathless thriller, part story of innocence lost, part story of romantic love, The Orphan Master's Son is also a riveting portrait of a world heretofore hidden from view: a North Korea rife with hunger, corruption, and casual cruelty but also camaraderie, stolen moments of beauty, and love."
Adam Johnson will be in Ann Arbor Tuesday, January 24th, 7pm at Nicola's Books. Get there early.
* * * = Starred Reviews
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #306
by muffy
Already an international bestseller Maria Duenas' The Time in Between * * (translated from the Spanish by Daniel Hahn) is the inspiring, richly textured story of a seemingly ordinary woman who uses her talent and courage to transform herself first into a prestigious couturier and then into an undercover agent for the Allies during World War II. (This title is also available in the original Spanish language).
At age twelve, Sira Quiroga sweeps the atelier floors where her single mother works as a seamstress. At fourteen, she quietly begins her own apprenticeship. By her early twenties she has learned the ropes of the business and is engaged to a modest government clerk. With the Spanish Civil War brewing in Madrid, Sira impetuously following her handsome lover to Morocco, only to be abandoned and penniless. Sira reinvents herself by turning to the one skill that can save her: her gift for creating beautiful clothes.
As WWII looms, Sira is persuaded by the British Government to return to Madrid, where she takes on a new identity, and embarks on the most dangerous undertaking of her career - as a spy. Being the preeminent couturier for an eager clientele of Nazi officers' wives, Sira is able to navigate within the world of espionage and political conspiracy rife with love, intrigue, and betrayal.
"(F)lawlessly researched, and breathlessly paced... this debut novel captures the beauty and decadence of pre-WWII Europe".
"A wonderful novel, in the good old tradition, with intrigue, love, mystery and tender, audacious and well-drawn characters." ~ Mario Vargas Llosa, Nobel Prize Laureate.
Anyone with an interest in the world of fashion and the life of Coco Chanel will find this fascinating.
If you like the smooth blend of romantic fiction, spy thriller, and sassy heroines, then I would like to suggest Susan Isaacs' Shining Through (1988), Signed, Mata Hari (2007) by Yannick Murphy, and A Game of Lies by Rebecca Cantrell (2011).
* * = starred reviews
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #305
by muffy
Picked by Library Journal as one of the 8 best Women's Fiction of 2011, debut novelist Sarah Jio's The Violets of March is a rich blend of history, mystery, and romance.
After a heartbreaking divorce, author Emily Wilson returns to Bainbridge Island, WA, to put some distance between her tattered life in New York, and to reconnect with her elderly and secretive great-aunt Bee. When she comes across the diary of a woman named Esther from the 1940s, she is totally drawn into the mystery of lives on the Island, and begins to see the parallels to her own situation and connections to her family history. A charming old beau and the handsome neighbor down the beach provide romantic tension and love interest as Emily tries to ferret out the story behind the diary while attempting to make a fresh start.
Not brain surgery, but a pleasant, charming story in a lovely setting. For fans of the Sarah Blake, Julie Buxbaum, Juliette Fay, Sarah Pekkanan, and Allison Winn Scotch.
Jio's second novel Bungalow has just been released. Can't wait.
For other novels with Pacific Northwest setting, check out Owl Island by Randy Sue Coburn, Summer Island by Kristin Hannah or the inspirational Cedar Cove Series (imaginary place) by Debbie Macomber.
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #304
by muffy
My reading gets downright frantic when the "Best Of" lists start showing up at the end of the year. Glad this one made the lists.
Named by both the Kirkus Reviews' as one of the Best of 2011 Mysteries, and a Library Journal Best Mystery of 2011 Stealing Mona Lisa * * was published to coincide with the 100th Anniversary of the theft of the most recognized painting in the world from the Louvre in 1911.
First-time novelist Carson Morton (professional musician, screenwriter, and playwright), "smoothly blends fact and fiction while evocatively exploring the era's seamy underbelly."
Paris, 1925. On his death bed the Marquis Eduardo de Valfierno recounts to a young reporter his audacious plan to steal the Mona Lisa, and the elaborate scheme to pass 6 forged copies off into the hands of American tycoons with insatiable appetite for the unattainable. As well orchestrated as the plan was, it was undone by nature - human and otherwise, when "love, lust, jealousy, greed, and murderous revenge come into play, along with excessive rains and the worst flooding in contemporary Paris history."
Stealing Mona Lisa is a "sophisticated, engaging caper, complete with a richly imagined group of con artists and a historical mystery that will keep you guessing until the very end." The twisty conclusion will leave you wondering about the authenticity of the art on museum walls !!
For a historical account of the famous heist and largely unsolved mystery, try R.A. Scotti's Vanished Smile: the mysterious theft of Mona Lisa (also in audio).
The Crimes of Paris: A True Story of Murder, Theft, and Detection by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler is "part fast-paced thriller and part social history," and an unwieldy and engrossing account of life and crime in belle époque Paris, with the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa serving as the centerpiece.
One last thing...do allow for the author's exercise of artistic license with the chronology of the Paris flood which actually took place the previous year, as captured in these vintage photos. You might also find fascinating Paris Under Water : how the city of light survived the great flood of 1910 by Jeffrey H. Jackson.
* * = starred reviews
Blog Post
Fabulous Fiction Firsts #303 : Small Gems
by muffy
Once again, something that would fit in your coat pocket, something you could whip out while standing in line at the post office or the market. It passes the time, keeps you from the nervous foot tapping, and don't be surprised that strangers would come up to you and tell you what a smart idea it is.
Who does not dream of Paris in the spring time? (Did you take a look at the weather outside?) In Ellen Sussman's novel French Lessons (her first in our collection), a single day in the City of Light changes the lives of three Americans as they each set off to explore the city with a French tutor, succumbing to unexpected passion and unpredictable adventures, while learning about language, love, and loss as their lives intersect in surprising ways.
"Pleasantly evocative escape" - just when we need it most.
In Jane Austen's (1775-1817) Love and Friendship where tragedy and comedy go hand in hand, she delivers a stringent satire on drawing-room society, on the lives and loves of teenage girls, brilliantly heralding her later masterpieces. This delightful but long neglected volume comprises of 2 short epistolary novels and 5 short stories written in letter form.
A comforting visit with an old friend.
A haunting literary debut set in the remote Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) where Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan meet, where traditions both brutal and beautiful, create a rigid structure for life in the wild, the The Wandering Falcon tells of the harrowing journey of a young couple running from the cruel fate that awaits them for their transgression against family and culture. Their son Tor Baz , born under extreme circumstances and descended from rules and outlaws, becomes The Wandering Falcon.
In the rich, dramatic tones of a master storyteller, Jamil Ahmad has written "an unforgettable portrait of a world of custom and compassion, of love and cruelty, of hardship and survival, a place fragile, unknown, and unforgiving". Jamil Ahmad was born in 1930. He joined the Civil Service of Pakistan in 1954 and was posted as minister in Pakistan's embassy in Kabul for many years. He now lives in Islamabad with his wife, Helga Ahmad, a nationally recognized environmentalist and social worker. This is his first book.