a picture is worth...

The Lantern of Lost Memories by Sanaka Hiigari, translated by Jesse Kirkwood

Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: healing fiction

Review: The Lantern of Lost Memories is, at the same time, a cohesive novel, and a collection of three short stories that seem only loosely connected until the end, when the connection becomes much clearer.

Each story begins with a delivery,  The deliveryman, Yama, brings a box to Mr. Hirasaki and they have a cheerful exchange, as they always do.  Yama comments on the size of the box, and makes a prediction about Mr. Hirasaki's next visitor based on the size and heft of the box.  Each box contains photographs - precisely one photograph for every day of the life of the next to visit Mr. Hirasaki's photo studio.

The photo studio is a waystation between life and the afterlife.  The recently deceased must sift through their individual boxes of photos and choose one for each year of their life.  The photos will then be placed on a spinning lantern to give them a last chance to relive their favorite memories.  Additionally, each person has the opportunity to go back to one day in their life to retake a photograph of a special memory.

Mr. Hirasaka is on hand for every state of the journey from death to afterlife, but doesn't know why he's stuck in the liminal space of the photo studio.  Unlike his guests, he has no memories of his life or death, and only a single photograph of himself to go by.  As the last story wraps up, and the threads begin to tie together, we get hints of why this is so, but no clear picture (pun intended) emergese.  Perhaps a sequel is in the works in which Mr. Hirasaka will help more people make the transition from life to death and will also learn more about himself.

Overall, a thoughtful and reflective addition to the healing fiction genre.

on repeat, but lovely

Love in Plane Sight by Lauren Connolly

Rating: 4.5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: romance

Review: Lauren Connolly knows how to write a romance that a reader can root for.  Watching Beth and George fall in love and overcome obstacles was absolutely lovely.  Though Beth's is slightly fuller, both have well-drawn backstories that make the road they're on together very real.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure that Connolly would agree that she's given us excellent backstories, because she feels the need to repeat Beth's several times.  We get it.  We understand why Beth accepts George's offer of free flying lessons but is afraid to act on her attraction to him.  We get that she's worried about money but doesn't want to cause her mother any stress.  We get it.  Let's move on.

I have to say, though, that my favorite parts of this book involve Beth's book club with her brother, especially the scene where she tries to win an argument by standing on his coffee table and shouting.  Except they really resolve their literary disputes over a deck of cards and shots of tequila.  It's absolutely marvelously written.

FTC Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for this review.

friends are everything

Charlotte Illes Is Not a Detective by Katie Siegel

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

Genre: cozy mystery

Review: Charlotte Illes was a detective when she was a kid.  But that was then, and this is now, and she does not want to talk about it.  Unfortunately, she doesn't really have a sense of who she is now.  But she's not a detective, and watching her childhood friends figure out who they are as adults is giving her a crisis of confidence.  Convincing herself that they don't need or want her messy feelings in their lives, she begins to pull away from them, and from her older brother.  But when her brother's girlfriend starts getting love notes from an anonymous stranger, Charlotte agrees to poke around a little bit.  Soon, she's got two mysteries to solve, and her friends are eager to resume their roles as her trusty assistants.  Can Charlotte figure out how to move into adulthood with her friends, and maybe still be a detective, a little bit, on the side?

Charlotte is a very sympathetic character, and readers will be rooting for her to not only solve the mysteries, but also to figure out how to be both a former kid detective and an adult.  The best parts of the book, though, are Charlotte's interactions with her best friends, Lucy and Gabe.  The bond that they share, and the support they give to Charlotte, and that she's relearning to give to them, is beautifully written, and comes wrapped in the best kind of snarky dialogue.

With a cast of diverse, likeable, and offbeat characters, and an intricate plot, this book will have instant appeal for fans of cozy mysyteries.

short and sweet

A Coffee for Two by Renée Gendron

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

Genre: romance, novella

Review: In this first installment of Megan the Matchmaker's Brilliant Blind Dates, Megan sends reluctant coworker Arianna on a blind date at a local coffee shop.  When the coffee shop becomes the meeting place for a local improv history group, the two find themselves falling for each other as they lean in to the hilarity surrounding them.  Short, sweet, and funny, this novella is a lovely bite-sized romance.

FTC Disclaimer: I received this e-book from the author in exchange for this review.

6DoBS - August - The Museum of Modern Love by Heather Rose

We start with *The Museum of Modern Love by Heather Rose.

Heather Rose also wrote The Butterfly Man.

Not too many books have butterflies in the title.

But *In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez does.

In the Time of the Butterflies takes place in the Dominican Republic during Trujillo's rule.

*The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz also deals with the Trujillo's rule in the Dominican Republic.

The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao was shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award.

Someone by Alice McDermott was also shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award. 

Alice McDermott is an inductee in the Empire State Center for the Book Hall of Fame.

Colson Whitehead, author of *John Henry Days, is also an inductee in the Empire State Center for the Book Hall of Fame.

Colson Whitehead has childhood ties to Long Island.

Alice Hoffman, author of The Museum of Extraordinary Things, grew up on Long Island.

From Modern Love to Extraordinary Things, it's all about museums that aren't.

*indicates that I've read the book

6DoBS - July - Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck

We start with Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck, in which 19-year-old Katherina begins an affair with a married man in the late 1980s and follows their relationship through the fall of East Germany and beyond.

Kairos is translated from German, as is *Inkheart by Cornelia Funke.

In Inkheart, fictional characters escape from their books.

In *The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde, the antagonist wants to live outside of his book.

The Eyre Affair takes place in an alternate history.

*The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal also takes place in an alternate history.

In The Calculating Stars, a meteor strike causes drastic climate change that changes the development of space travel. 

The development of space travel is changed by the explosion of the moon in *Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. 

Neal Stephenson received his Bachelor's degree from Boston University.

Isaac Asimov was a professor at Boston University.

Isaac Asimov won several Hugo Awards, including one for The Foundation Trilogy.

Carl Sagan also won a Hugo Award, for Cosmos.

From Kairos to Cosmos, it's all Greek to me!

*indicates that I've read the book

6DoBS - June - Butter by Asako Yuzuki

We start with Butter by Asako Yuzuki, which features a gourmet cook imprisoned for serial murder and the journalist who interviews her.

Butter is inspired by a true story, as is Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez.

Take My Hand centers around questions of reproductive freedom in the 1970s.

*All You Have to Do is Call by Kerri Maher is a fictionalized account of the Jane Collective, an underground abortion network in the 1970s.

All You Have to Do is Call takes place in Chicago.

Much of the action in *Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano takes place in Chicago.

Basketball is a big part of Hello Beautiful. 

Basketball also features in *The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian takes place in Washington State.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition, the subject of Undaunted Courage, ends in Washington State.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition also crossed through Idaho.

What says Idaho more than potatoes?!  We end with The Potato: How the Humble Spud Saved the Western World.

From Butter to The Potato!

*indicates that I've read the book