THE SECRET OF MAGIC by Deborah Johnson

This is a wonderful book!  The book jacket does not do it justice.  I almost didn’t buy it. Then I started reading and couldn’t put it down.  The writing reminds me of THE HELP or TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD or IN COLD BLOOD or even MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL – all great books.

A black war hero is returning home to Mississippi after WWII when he is beaten to death and dumped in the river.  The story concerns the hero’s father and the two women – one white, one black – who want to see justice served in a segregated Jim Crow South. The characters in this book are real people (fictional) who are shown in both their goodness and their fear, their needs and their disappointments, their triumphs and their failures.  The town of Revere, Mississippi, is as much a character as the people who populate the town -  the District Attorney, the sheriff, the white lawyer and the black lawyer, the erstwhile lover and his wife and son, the maybe murderess and the ever present sense of fear and “place.”

The story is riveting. You will not be disappointed.  Book groups will find a wealth of topics to discuss.

5 of 5 stars

GAME, SET and MURDER by Elizabeth Flynn

If you like tennis and you like cozy murder mysteries you will love this book.  Detective Inspector Angela Costello is on her first case as a DI when a beloved tennis star is found dead under suspicious circumstances. Costello is a likeable character who thinks carefully through the clues and suspects.  Red herrings abound with the suspect tennis players and their friends (enemies?) who are individuals and not stock characters. The plot is full of surprises and twists that will keep you guessing until the final pages.. 

This is a quick read that is quite enjoyable.  I look forward to reading more about DI Angela Costello.

4 of 5 stars

ENDER'S GAME by Orson Scott Card

ENDER”S GAME   by Orson Scott Card

This young adult book has been out for some time, but I had never read it before.  The premise is a child (Ender, age 6) is a genius at war games on the computer and the adults will use him to win a war against the “buggers.” It will soon be a major motion picture.  I felt that the story could have been told as a Western or other genre as easily as Sci-fi.  The battle scenes were exciting while the psychological scenes were boring and mercifully brief.  The book was interesting as a war/battle story but I was disappointed as I was looking for a classic, memorable tale. 

Ender is a fully developed character and the reader is allowed to see how his mind is developed and manipulated as the story proceeds and Ender ages from 6 to 15 years or so.  The brother and sister are less well developed, the brother only seen through the eyes (mind) of Ender and the sister.  Several adult characters also appear in one dimensional form. They serve to guide (or manipulate) Ender through the intricacies of the “game” meant to train him for the coming war.

The end will not be a surprise to the adult reader.  Book groups will want to discuss the psychology and manipulation of children. Morality and violence may also be topics as well as fear of others different from the norm.

3 of 5 stars.

THE INVENTION OF WINGS by Sue Monk Kidd

THE INVENTION OF WINGS   by Sue Monk Kidd

Kidd’s retelling of the Grimke sisters and their fight for equality for women and the abolition of slavery is told with sympathy and fact.  Although much of the story is fiction, Kidd manages to remain true to the real life story of Sarah and Angelina Grimke in the days and decades before the Civil War.  A number of “big names” appear in the sisters’ ongoing struggle to be heard in a male dominated South and respected in a male dominated North.

The tale loses momentum in the middle, possibly because the sisters’ actual lives also stalled in their middle years.   The addition of the totally fictional characters of Charlotte and Hetty carry the story well, giving the slave side of Southern life.  The horrors of slavery are graphically depicted.

I can recommend this book without reservation for anyone interested in Southern life, abolition, women’s rights, and the life style and treatment of women in antebellum Charleston, South Carolina. Also interesting is the role of the church (in many permutations) in the condoning of slavery and the treatment of women.

5 of 5 stars

A STOLEN LIFE by Jaycee Dugard

Jaycee Dugard suffered unspeakable horror for 18 years.  Kidnapped by a pedophile at age eleven and kept for 18 years, Dugard bore two children and came to depend upon her captor all while striving to maintain her “self” and remember her “real” family, especially her mother. 

Her memoir tells of her heroism and fortitude in the face of unrelenting adversity.  Often the voice of that eleven year old is heard; often the voice of a struggling 19 year old woman and mother is heard.  She, at times, voices a maturity earned through pain. She struggles to shield her children from the press even while acknowledging the impossibility of that task.  She struggles to heal herself and rejoin the “normal’ world.

It is impossible to read this memoir without suffering with Jaycee. It is also impossible to justify a critical review of this book.  5 of 5 stars

The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

In an interesting twist on the pre-Civil War story of slavery, Grissom presents us with an Irish child orphaned on the ocean crossing and delivered into the life of an indentured servant. Because Lavinia is only 6 years old as the tale begins, she is handed over to the “house slaves” to raise by the master of the house.  Belle, who ultimately becomes Lavinia’s “mother/sister,” is the master’s illegitimate daughter and receives many privileges because of this relationship.  Promised her freedom by the master, Belle unhappily comes under the eye of the master’s son who is unduly influenced by the evil overseer. 

Grissom has written an engrossing tale of life of “house slave, “field slave” and bullied and frightened wife. The characters are clearly written, the scenes are believable, the secrets are many.  The plot will grab your interest from the first page and keep you reading to the final page.  Grissom has a clear vision of plantation life, family relationships, and the fear engendered by powerlessness.  The tempo of the story gains momentum as the characters reveal their lies, secrets, loves, hopes and fears as Lavinia grows from child to adult.

5 of 5 stars