Point Last Seen

Point Last Seen by Christina Dodd
7/26/22; 416 pages
Harlequin

Point Last Seen by Christina Dodd is a recommended mystery with romance overtones.

Gothic, the city of lost souls, is a town on the Pacific coast where everyone has a past. When Adam Ramsdell, recovering from his own personal issues, finds a body in the surf he is shocked to discover she is still alive. Elle is covered with bruises, weak, and frightened. Certainly the obvious hand prints around her throat indicate someone meant to harm her. She doesn't remember what happened and doesn't remember her full name. She does know she wants to avoid authorities and calling attention to herself. Adam does his best to care for her, but he keeps getting the feeling that he is being watched. The obvious fact is that in the small town of Gothic, a newcomer with bruises can't hide and rumors are bound to spread quickly about the woman who washed ashore half dead.

Once the story sets up the initial plot, introduces the characters, and reveals who Elle is and who is looking for her, things get a bit paradoxical. She can't remember her last name and is seriously injured, but she's able to admire Adam in a less than chaste manner. The plot lost all seriousness for me at that point because I knew what we were going to experience was some trope on a damsel in distress saved by a knight in shining armor. You can proclaim that the damsel is a strong, independent woman all you want, but the plot is still headed down this well-trodden path.

Stick this out for the mystery/action/thriller portion and suspend your disbelief on the rest. The writing is good and the mystery/thriller part of the novel will hold your interest while you flip through the rest. If romance novels are your preference, this will be an appealing novel for you and a good choice for a summer read.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Harlequin via NetGalley.

Little Rumours

Little Rumours by Bryony Pearce
3/31/22; 416 pages
Avon

Little Rumours by Bryony Pearce is a highly recommended domestic thriller concerning three very different women searching for a missing child.

In Exton Cross everyone knows everyone else and their family and new comers are basically unwelcome. Little Rumours follows three different mothers and their children. Naomi, who grew up in Exton Cross, is an accepted member of the community. Aleema has lived here for three years and hasn't made a single friend even though she's married to a local, but she's a newcomer and Muslim, therefore suspect. Kelly is an outsider and wants it to stay that way to protect her privacy. When Aleema's daughter Mia disappears, the whole community starts looking, but the rumours and accusations also start flying.

The narrative unfolds through the point-of-view of Naomi, Aleema, and Kelly in alternating chapters. Aleema and Kelly are fully realized and complicated characters with secrets and fears they want to keep hidden. Their children are all best friends, which is what pulls the three women together in searching for Mia, but also tears them apart. Most of the characters aren't always easy to connect with because they aren't all that likable. The alternating viewpoints, however, work well in the plot.

Little Rumours didn't immediately capture my complete attention during the slow start, but this did serve as a time to introduce all the characters and set up the action. There are all manner of social problems thrown into the mix along the way and the tension and suspense rises as the search for Mia continues. While it is a compelling concept for a plot, it did feel like it ran a little long and could have been tightened up. 3.5 rounded up.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Avon via NetGalley.

The Catch

The Catch by Alison Fairbrother
6/21/22; 288 pages
Penguin Random House

The Catch by Alison Fairbrother is a recommended domestic drama.

Ellie Adler, 24, is the oldest of her father's four children from three different marriages. James Adler, a poet, loves all of his children and Ellie has fond memories of the mixed family celebrating holidays at unique times with their father, for example, summer Christmas. When he suddenly dies from a heart attack days after she had visited for summer Thanksgiving, she is devastated. Ellie reads his famous poem, "The Catch," at his funeral. After this she learns he bequeathed specific items to his children in his will. She was expecting to get the baseball he kept on his desk, instead she is given a tie rack that means nothing to her and the baseball is given to someone she never heard of. This sets her on a quest to track this person down and find out who he is while also dealing with complications in her personal life.

The bulk of the plot consists of her tracking down someone because she wants what her father wanted to give to this man and her demanding more from her married 39 year-old boyfriend. Even giving her some grace due to her grief, Ellie's immaturity and ego-centrism becomes increasingly tiresome. I did appreciate the growth her character experienced in some areas but not so much in other ways. She does discover the reason for her father wanting her to have the tie rack. What is surprising is that she never heard the story surrounding the reason for it. She also learns some surprising information about her father.

If the majority of the novel simply consisted of Ellie finding out the truth behind the baseball and the reason for her father's bequeath to someone else, it would have made the story stronger. This search to uncover the truth is what compelled me to keep reading. Her demanding more from her affair with her 39 year-old married boyfriend was a big turn off for me and an unneeded distraction. Yet again I need to caution an author to keep their personal political/social views to themselves, which added nothing to the development of this novel. This diminishes and dates the novel while detracting from the narrative.

The Catch is a novel that starts out strong and then loses momentum along the way. The quality of the writing is quite good in this debut novel and despite the few hiccups along the way, it will be interesting to see what Fairbrother publishes next. 3.5 rounded down

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Penguin Random House via NetGalley.

The Lies I Tell

The Lies I Tell by Julie Clark
6/21/22; 320 pages
Sourcebooks

The Lies I Tell by Julie Clark is a very highly recommended fast-paced, intriguing story of revenge. The narrative alternates between the point-of-view of two women, one which has used many aliases over the years.

Meg Williams has gone by many names as an adult. She carefully uses a different name and history in whatever new town she has moved to for each new con job she is pulling. Meg is very intelligent and meticulously plans out each long con job. She will mold herself to be exactly who she wants you to see and will tell you exactly what you want to hear. Now she has returned to Los Angeles and is posing as a real estate agent. Her target is Ron Ashton, the man who swindled her mother and stole their home forcing the two of them to live in a van.

Kat Roberts is a journalist who blames Meg for ruing her life. For the past 10 years she has been looking for Meg, wanting to expose her for her crimes. Kat tracks Meg, becomes close to her under an assumed name, and Meg offers her a job with her company. As Kat investigates, though, the lines begin to blur between revenge and justice.

This well-written narrative uses the altering points-of-view and flashbacks to develop the characters and their background while keeping the pace quick throughout the novel. This results in fully realized characters and an intriguing, compelling plot. Meg does lie. She is clever and believable as she spins her story but exactly who are her target victims and toward what final purpose? As more information is disclosed readers will be questioning everything and everyone, including Kat's vendetta against her.

The pages will fly by in The Lies I Tell and hold your attention throughout the entire novel. The chapters from the past and present work together to create complex characters, a credible backstory, and work seamlessly to develop the intricate plot. One you start reading it will be hard to put it down, but it won't matter because the pages will fly by. This domestic story of revenge is entertaining escapism and should please a wide variety of readers. 4.5 rounded up

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Sourcebooks via NetGalley.

Arms Around Frank Richardson

Arms Around Frank Richardson by Sylvia Colley
6/16/22; 340 pages
Muswell Press

Arms Around Frank Richardson by Sylvia Colley is a very highly recommended literary family drama and character study.

Following Frank, Alice and Henry across thirty years this in-depth character study and family drama demonstrates the impact of childhood trauma on three different adults. Frank and his younger sister Kitty have been abused by both their alcoholic father and their mother's alcoholic and drug abusing boyfriend before they escape for their lives one night to the couple who live next door. From this point on Frank only wants to protect his sister and make sure everything goes smoothly. Alice is physically disabled and is frustrated by her limp and recurring pain. Henry is the son of wealthy parents who consider their artistic son less intelligent than his overachieving brother.

The novel alternates between these characters starting over 30 years in the past when they are all children and follows them into adulthood. They all deal with the families and fate that life has dealt them until by chance they all meet and interact together as adults. Essentially, for most of the novel readers will be following these different characters and their individual, separate stories until they gradually start to connect toward the end. The beginning of the novel takes patience as it is difficult to see where these individual stories, which are all compelling on their own, are going to somehow merge into a complete picture.

What hold will hold your interest in these character studies of individuals and their lives is the absolutely exquisite writing. Both the characters and the sense of time and place are carefully crafted and beautifully rendered. Even when the separate chapters seem so removed from each other it will be the writing that will keep you reading and caring about these flawed individuals. This is a simple incredible well-written work of literary fiction.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Muswell Press.

Local Gone Missing

Local Gone Missing by Fiona Barton
6/14/22; 384 pages
Penguin Publishing Group

Local Gone Missing by Fiona Barton is a highly recommended procedural/mystery.

Housecleaner Dee Eastwood shows up to clean the caravan where Pauline and Charlie Perry are living while purportedly restoring the crumbling estate Tall Trees when it is discovered Charlie (73 years-old) has disappeared. Seventeen days earlier Charlie had visited his daughter Birdie in the residential care facility where she lives due to brain damage caused during a burglary twenty years earlier. Charlie is six months behind in paying for Birdie's care, but Pauline objects to spending money on her care. Charlie's disappearance occurs on the first night that a large musical festival is being held in Ebbing where two teens overdose on drugs.

Elise King is a detective who is on medical leave who observes all the rising tensions in her community. She also employees Dee, who sees and knows many secrets, but keeps he mouth closed. When a man disappears and the teens overdose on the first night of the festival, Elise starts her own investigation with assistance from her friend Ronnie. Due to what she has already discovered, her DCI then asks her to come back to work on the case in the Major Crimes team. Elise uncovers a whole lot of information and secrets swirling through Ebbing.

The complicated plot switches back and forth between characters and alternates between the present and days in the past leading up to the present day. At first the quick pace may be a bit of an information and character overload as a plethora of facts and names are quickly introduced into the plot, but stick with it and soon information, secrets, and people will start to sort themselves out and form a larger picture.

Elise is an appealing character and it is compelling when she starts looking into what is going on in Ebbing. The novel was more appealing once it takes a clear direction toward being a procedural. It presents us with a satisfying investigation as more evidence is uncovered and pieces of the puzzle are put together. There are many characters who have some relationship or information about Charlie and others. This results in plenty of clues and suspects provided along the way and numerous subplots that sometimes left me struggling to keep interested in the overall story. 3.5 rounded up.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of the Penguin Publishing Group

Vacationland

Vacationland by Meg Mitchell Moore
6/14/22; 384 pages
HarperCollins

Vacationland by Meg Mitchell Moore is a highly recommended family drama.

Louisa McLean and her three children have arrived at her parents’ summer home in Rockland, Maine. They plan to spend the summer there while Louisa's husband, Steven, stays in Brooklyn to work. Louisa, a history professor on a sabbatical from NYU, has to finish her barely started book while watching the three kids, but this is proving difficult. Martin, Louisa’s father and retired judge, is suffering from Alzheimer’s and Annie, her mother, is worried about her husband and their finances. The children, Mattie, 12, Abigail, 10, and Claire, 7, have their own issues they are dealing with.

At the same time Kristie Turner arrives in Rockland after her mother’s death. She is deeply in debt and is planning to find work but more importantly she wants to talk to Martin about a secret her mother shared with Kristie before her death.

The characters come to life in this family drama. They are all fully realized characters with a depth of emotion, secrets, flaws, and fears. Chapters alternate from the point-of-view of Kristie, Louisa, her family members, and the housekeeper. Also included in the narrative are wonderful letters from Abigail to her father. The highlight of Vacationland is the character development and the look into their lives and thoughts.

The writing is excellent and it captures the lives of these people perfectly. The plot is predictable, but the characters and atmosphere created will keep you reading. This is a perfect choice for summer reading. It explores complications, secrets, and hurt in a family, but tackles their various issues with understanding, love, and, ultimately a sense of acceptance. The ending is satisfying and will leave you with a warm, fuzzy feeling.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of HarperCollins.