bethreadsandnaps's reviews
2637 reviews

4.25 stars 

 

I have read all three of Tracey Lange’s novels now, and I have to say that her upcoming novel WHAT HAPPENED TO THE MCCRAYS? is my favorite. The author has a theme in all her writing so far, and that’s healing after crisis/tragedy. Her other two novels focused on big family sibling dynamics, but this one focused on divorced couple Kyle and Casey. 

 

I think you might not know what to expect by looking at the cover. Were the McCrays taken from their house in the dead of winter? No. The McCrays are a divorced couple, and Kyle has been summoned back to his hometown to help out after his father is hospitalized. Casey still lives in the town. This novel moves back and forth between present day and the history of their relationship. 

 

There are plot-related triggers in this novel (two big ones!), so check a more thorough summary if you feel that would turn you off. 

 

Why I didn’t rate this higher is the main thrust of this novel isn’t very original. I’ve seen it quite a bit. I did think Lange had a deft hand in her writing though. She drops enough hints that you can piece together what happened before it’s revealed. Because this is a novel about healing and not one of suspense, I was completely good with not having any jaw-dropping moments. 

 

I thought the main characters  were good people going through stuff, so I had a good amount of empathy with them. 

 

There were two audiobook narrators, one male and one female, for this novel. Since the perspective switched between Casey and Kyle, the two narrators made sense. It also made it easier to keep track whose perspective the reader was in, and both narrators did a great job. I’d recommend taking in this novel on audio. 

 

Thank you to NetGalley and MacMillan Audio for an advance listener copy in exchange for an honest review. 

 

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE MCCRAYS? publishes January 14, 2025. 

 

#whathappenedtothemccrays #traceylange  #netgalley #netgalleyreviewer  #bookstagram  @Macmillanaudio 

 

3.5 ⭐️

Colleen McCullough’s THE THORN BIRDS takes the reader through Meggie’s life, starting when she was just 4 years old and the youngest in a family of older brothers through the end of her life. I found her role in the family interesting and how it impacted some of her decisions. 

There were parts of this story that seemed a bit implausible and overwrought. Fundamentally, I’d say this is a romance, and I think that’s a downside of that genre, in general, to me. 

How Luke was crafted annoyed me. He seemed like a decent guy and then became evil the moment they married. A few elements felt too simple. 

However, this novel has been on my list for a while, and I’m glad I finally got to it.

3.75 ⭐️

The author Griffin Dunne is the son of Dominick Dunne, the nephew of Joan Didion, and good friend of Carrie Fisher. This is a who’s who of the 1970s/early 1980s. I might be a hair too young to fully appreciate some of the pop culture moments, actors (though I recognized most of the names), and movies discussed in this memoir. Much of this felt name drop-py and self—serving. One part I particularly liked was how he told his perspective on his sister Dominique’s murder and subsequent trial of her murderer John Sweeney.

I always find it interesting to see what an author focuses on in their memoir. This memoir ends in 1990 with the author’s wedding to Carey Lowell and birth of his child Hannah. I’m not sure if this was intended to be Part 1 or if he thinks nothing noteworthy has happened in his life since 1990. 🤷‍♀️ This reader would have preferred the author to include post-1990 reflections. 

3.75 stars

Glad I finally got to this, read it because my daughter had to read it for school. The timing of reading this before a second Trump administration is appropriate. 

 

4.75 stars

While I have several of Jonathan Evison’s books on my list, his upcoming release THE HEART OF WINTER is the first novel I’ve read by him. I was so blown away by it! 

In this novel, we are introduced to an elderly (on the cusp of 90 years old) married couple Abe and Ruth. Ruth discovers a loose tooth in 2023, and that leads to a cancer diagnosis. The reader is then taken through the journey of them meeting and their marriage from the 1950s through 2024. This is a study of these two people as individuals and their marriage together. They had a tough early marriage with a child right away, causing Ruth to feel saddled by domesticity, and Abe making decisions for both of them without talking to his wife. When things evened out some, they lost their second daughter. Life was often bumpy, but these two stuck it out. 

I felt like I identified with each Ruth and Abe in some ways, and I felt that Evison drew the characters so well. There were specific scenes toward the end that broke my heart - and one that also made me laugh when Abe was looking for prune juice at Safeway. 

Character-driven readers who enjoy reading about a character over a lifetime (think THE HEART’S INVISIBLE FURIES) are the target demographic for this book. I think this will strike a chord for middle-aged readers, like me, as well. They can identify with the life decisions these characters experienced for much of the novel, and they can also see a preview of what’s coming in the future or perhaps identify with what their parents are dealing with. I loved how the author created scenes, but sometimes there was more narration when I thought a scene or longer scene would make the point better. 

“Sometimes we need a complement, a contradiction, a counterpoint to be our best selves.”

Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton Books for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. 

THE HEART OF WINTER publishes January 7, 2025. 

 

 

4.25 stars

Marie Benedict’s upcoming historical fiction novel THE QUEENS OF CRIME takes the reader on a journey of learning about how five female detective writers, including Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers, came together to form the Queens of Crime and solve a real-life murder of a nurse who vanished five months prior and was found in the woods. Think THURSDAY MURDER CLUB with female detective writers. 

I thoroughly enjoyed learning about these strong detective writers with a dose of feminism and a dose of empathy in learning about what was going on in the victim’s life and mind in the months leading up to her disappearance. Marie Benedict is very thorough in her research, and I particularly loved the character of Dorothy Sayers, a name which I have heard through the years but didn’t know anything about her. The other women detectives were interesting as well, but the reader doesn’t get a ton about the other detective writers except for Agatha Christie. I’m fairly confident that Benedict’s interest about this group was piqued while researching THE MYSTERY OF MRS. CHRISTIE. 

Narrator Bessie Carter did a splendid job on the narration. She was easy to understand with a nice English accent and did voices very well with emphasis and emotion when needed. This is a great one to listen to on audio because the reader is in Dorothy’s perspective the entire time, and the story is pretty straightforward. 

I’m almost a Marie Benedict completist, and THE QUEENS OF CRIME has risen to be my favorite of her novels. If you enjoy historical fiction and enjoy early twentieth century detective novels, I think this will be a hit for you.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for an advance listener copy in exchange for an honest review. 

THE QUEENS OF CRIME publishes February 11, 2025. 

 

Rob recounts 50 years prior when he gave his father a Christmas gift of milking the cows before his father awakened. It came across a little trite and a bit repetitive about Rob’s realization that his father loved him because his father didn’t want to awaken him for this chore each morning. 

It was a sweet gift of a child to give his father, but I thought the real gift would be to tell his father he didn’t have to wake up obscenely early, get dressed, and trek out to the barn in the cold. All of that the father still had to do before realizing the son already milked the cows. 

4.25 stars

What a strong classic that I've been intimidated by for some time. I'm glad I read this novel that shows how slavery affected Alex Haley's family tree. I felt like the reader spends a lot of time with Kunta Kinte (the patriarch), but each subsequent generation is covered increasingly quickly. In some places that worked for me because, for instance, I didn't want to spend as much time with Chicken George. But I felt the story diluted over time because I didn't feel I understood the later generation characters as much. 

3.25 stars

I liked the first half of this story, which has the main character basically have a quarter life crisis as he looks at a newly built house and prepare himself to embark on a life as a burglar. He has been down on his luck, with his life spiraling. 

And then….wonder of wonders, his parents have moved into the house he is burgling. Of course they haven’t given up on him and smother him with love (does this make sense why a young man would part with such loving and supportive parents?), and his life of crime ends up being mere nanoseconds. 

🙄

I absolutely loved this short story! Kaushik, a college student, is dumbfounded when his father marries a younger woman with two small girls a few years after his mother's death. He goes home for winter break, and he's now a guest in his own home, with the two girls taking over his old room, memories of his mother coming back to him, and a new woman there replacing his mother. 

Set over the winter break, Kaushik is easy to identify with, and your heart hurts for him.