Snowflakes and Spider Silk

Title:  The Dinner Author:  Herman Koch Genre: Psychological thriller, suspense, unreliable narrator My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary: An internationally bestselling phenomenon: the darkly suspenseful, highly controversial tale of two families struggling to make the hardest decision of their lives -- all over the course of one meal. It's a summer's evening in Amsterdam, and two couples meet at a fashionable restaurant for dinner. Between mouthfuls of food and over the polite scrapings of cutlery, the conversation remains a gentle hum of polite discourse -- the banality of work, the triviality of the holidays. But behind the empty words, terrible things need to be said, and with every forced smile and every new course, the knives are being sharpened. Each couple has a fifteen-year-old son. The two boys are united by their accountability for a single horrific act; an act that has triggered a police investigation and shattered the comfortable, insulated worlds...

Title:  The Roanoke Girls Author:  Amy Engel Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary: After her mother's suicide, fifteen year-old Lane Roanoke came to live with her grandparents and fireball cousin, Allegra, on their vast estate in rural Kansas. Lane knew little of her mother's mysterious family, but she quickly embraced life as one of the rich and beautiful Roanoke girls. But when she discovered the dark truth at the heart of the family, she ran fast and far away. Eleven years later, Lane is adrift in Los Angeles when her grandfather calls to tell her Allegra has gone missing. Did she run too? Or something worse? Unable to resist his pleas, Lane returns to help search, and to ease her guilt at having left Allegra behind. Her homecoming may mean a second chance with the boyfriend whose heart she broke that long ago summer. But it also means facing the devastating secret that made her flee, one she may not be strong enough to...

Title:  The Girl Before Author:   J.P. Delaney Genre: Psychological thriller, mystery My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary : Please make a list of every possession you consider essential to your life. The request seems odd, even intrusive—and for the two women who answer, the consequences are devastating. Emma Reeling from a traumatic break-in, Emma wants a new place to live. But none of the apartments she sees are affordable or feel safe. Until One Folgate Street. The house is an architectural masterpiece: a minimalist design of pale stone, plate glass, and soaring ceilings. But there are rules. The enigmatic architect who designed the house retains full control: no books, no throw pillows, no photos or clutter or personal effects of any kind. The space is intended to transform its occupant—and it does. Jane After a personal tragedy, Jane needs a fresh start. When she finds One Folgate Street she is instantly drawn to the space—and to its aloof but seductive...

Okay, here's round 2 of the bullet reviews. In case you missed the first set, I'm doing a couple of quick bullet point reviews of books I read last fall/winter so I can catch up by the end of the month (fingers crossed). This week's books are The Trespasser, The Revanant, and The Accident. My loose theme for them is that they are all mystery/suspense novels, and I read them all in October. They're actually very different; Trespasser is a character-focused and psychological mystery, The Revanant is not a mystery but it is very suspenseful and intense historical fiction, and The Accident is more of a fluffy, fun mystery. The Trespasser by Tana French Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller Rating: 5/5 stars What I liked: this is yet another winner from Tana French! She's my favorite mystery author because of her books are character-centric instead of plot-twisty (but there are still awesome revelations!) I loved getting to see the other perspect...

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by  The Broke and the Bookish . This week's theme:  Top Ten Halloween Books for the Faint of Heart I'm a really big scaredy-cat when it comes to horror. I get disturbed really easily and  I don't like reading books that are dark without any light-hearted parts or nice warm-fuzzies to balance them out. So here's a few creepy/Halloween-themed books that I liked and didn't freak me out too much!   This book is full of ghouls and ghosts and other things that stalk the night, but it's actually a really endearing coming of age story :)   This book terrified me when our 3rd grade teacher read it to us in class, but I loved it anyway. It's sinister and creepy without being gory or over-the-top.   I liked The Diviners better than Lair of Dreams, but this one is still a lot of fun and features ghosts and a lot of mysterious happenings.   This book isn't technically Halloween...

Title:  The Girl on the Train Author:  Paula Hawkins Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary: Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She’s even started to feel like she knows them. “Jess and Jason,” she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost. And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel offers what she knows to the police, and becomes inextricably entwined in what happens next, as well as in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good? I really don't know what all the hype is about. This is a good psychological thriller/mystery, but it doesn'...

Title:  The Hollow City Author:  Dan Wells Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller, science fiction My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary: Dan Wells won instant acclaim for his three-novel debut about the adventures of John Wayne Cleaver, a heroic young man who is a potential serial killer. All who read the trilogy were struck by the distinctive and believable voice Wells created for John. Now he returns with another innovative thriller told in a very different, equally unique voice. A voice that comes to us from the  realm of madness. Michael Shipman is paranoid schizophrenic; he suffers from hallucinations, delusions, and complex fantasies of persecution and horror. That’s bad enough. But what can he do if some of the monsters he sees turn out to be real? Who can you trust if you can't even trust yourself? The Hollow City is a mesmerizing journey into madness, where the greatest enemy of all is your own mind. Before this book, I'd read and loved Dan Wel...

Title:  Black-Eyed Susans Author:  Julia Heaberlin Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller, adult My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary : I am the star of screaming headlines and campfire ghost stories. I am one of the four Black-Eyed Susans. The lucky one. As a sixteen-year-old, Tessa Cartwright was found in a Texas field, barely alive amid a scattering of bones, with only fragments of memory as to how she got there. Ever since, the press has pursued her as the lone surviving “Black-Eyed Susan,” the nickname given to the murder victims because of the yellow carpet of wildflowers that flourished above their shared grave. Tessa’s testimony about those tragic hours put a man on death row. Now, almost two decades later, Tessa is an artist and single mother. In the desolate cold of February, she is shocked to discover a freshly planted patch of black-eyed susans—a summertime bloom—just outside her bedroom window. Terrified at the implications—that she sent the wrong ...

Title:  The Secret Place Author: Tana French Genre: Mystery, psychological thriller My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary : The photo on the card shows a boy who was found murdered, a year ago, on the grounds of a girls’ boarding school in the leafy suburbs of Dublin. The caption says, I KNOW WHO KILLED HIM. Detective Stephen Moran has been waiting for his chance to get a foot in the door of Dublin’s Murder Squad—and one morning, sixteen-year-old Holly Mackey brings him this photo. The Secret Place, a board where the girls at St. Kilda’s School can pin up their secrets anonymously, is normally a mishmash of gossip and covert cruelty, but today someone has used it to reignite the stalled investigation into the murder of handsome, popular Chris Harper. Stephen joins forces with the abrasive Detective Antoinette Conway to find out who and why. But everything they discover leads them back to Holly’s close-knit group of friends and their fierce enemies, a rival clique—a...

Title:  The Likeness Author:  Tana French Genre: mystery, psychological thriller, adult fiction My rating: 5 of 5 stars Goodreads summary: Six months after the events of In the Woods, Detective Cassie Maddox is still trying to recover. She's transferred out of the murder squad and started a relationship with Detective Sam O'Neill, but she's too badly shaken to make a commitment to him or to her career. Then Sam calls her to the scene of his new case: a young woman found stabbed to death in a small town outside Dublin. The dead girl's ID says her name is Lexie Madison (the identity Cassie used years ago as an undercover detective, and she looks exactly like Cassie. With no leads, no suspects, and no clue to Lexie's real identity, Cassie's old undercover boss, Frank Mackey, spots the opportunity of a lifetime. They can say that the stab wound wasn't fatal and send Cassie undercover in her place to find out information that the police never would and...

Title:  Black Chalk Author:  Christopher J. Yates Genre: Psychological thriller, adult fiction My rating: 3 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary : One game. Six students. Five survivors. It was only ever meant to be a game. A game of consequences, of silly forfeits, childish dares. A game to be played by six best friends in their first year at Oxford University. But then the game changed: the stakes grew higher and the dares more personal, more humiliating, finally evolving into a vicious struggle with unpredictable and tragic results. Now, fourteen years later, the remaining players must meet again for the final round. When I read the blurb, I was expecting something à la Lord of the Flies - a group of ordinary young people who discover their darker natures when pitted against one another. The description promises a game that "[evolves] into a vicious struggle with unpredictable and tragic results", but that's really not what you get. This book is about six friends...

Title:  Precious Thing Author:  Colette McBeth Genre: Psychological thriller, mystery, adult fiction My rating: 2 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary:  I know her inside out.  I know what she’s thinking, I know what she wants. So I can’t give up on her, she knows I never will. Some friendships fizzle out. Rachel and Clara promised theirs would last forever. They met in high school when Rachel was the shy, awkward new girl and Clara was the friend everyone wanted. Instantly, they fell under one another’s spell and nothing would be the same again. Now in their late twenties Rachel has the television career, the apartment and the boyfriend, while Clara’s life is spiraling further out of control. Yet despite everything, they remain inextricably bound. Then Rachel’s news editor assigns her to cover a police press conference, and she is shocked when she arrives to learn that the subject is Clara, reported missing. Is it abduction, suicide or something else altogether? ...

Title:  In the Woods Author:  Tana French Genre: mystery, psychological thriller, adult fiction My rating:  4.5 of 5 stars Goodreads summary: As dusk approaches a small Dublin suburb in the summer of 1984, mothers begin to call their children home. But on this warm evening, three children do not return from the dark and silent woods. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours. Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox—his partner and closest friend—find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of t...