Author: Callen

One of Us is Lying by Karen McManus

- Callen Leave a comment

As you might know by now, the things I love in books include: murder mysteries, retellings of iconic works, and ensemble casts. Recently I discovered that One of Us Is Lying by Karen McManus ticks all three of those boxes! It’s a twist on the iconic movie The Breakfast Club, featuring a compelling murder mystery, and it features a dynamic and well-rounded set of characters. I devoured this book in a  a day or two, because it’s very compelling reading and I had to know whodunit.

The brain is Bronwyn: driven and Ivy League bound. The athlete is Cooper: a baseball player already being scouted by teams and colleges alike. The princess is Addy: the popular girl with the perfect boyfriend. The criminal is Nate: the drug dealer with a broken home and a bad reputation. These four find themselves in detention with Simon, who runs their school’s notorious gossip app and loves spilling everybody’s secrets. But before their punishment is over, Simon is dead and they’re facing a lot of tough questions. Their lives, and their secrets, will never be the same again.

One of my favorite things about this book was the character development. Rather than sticking to their typecast roles, these characters grow, change, and discover new things about themselves through the course of their ordeal. Nobody is quite who they appear to be, in both good and chilling ways throughout the story. It reminded me strongly of the new Jumanji movies in that a dangerous situation is brightened by unexpected friendships made along the way.

Even better – there’s a sequel! One Of Us Is Next is available now, and to my delight it doesn’t immediately put the same characters in danger, derailing all their personal growth and happy endings. Instead, secondary characters from the first novel (including Bronwyn’s hacker younger sister) step into center stage in the second, taking on a whole new mystery and a whole new set of secrets. If you like hopeful mysteries, teen books, great characters, or can’t get enough of The Breakfast Club, I recommend this author’s work whole-heartedly.

By Popular Demand: Scary Recommendations for All Ages

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Autumn is a great time of year to read scary stories – so long as you’re safely curled up in a blanket with a hot drink, with lots of lights on. Lately I’ve helped several patrons find their next spooky read, so I wanted to take this opportunity to give my best scary book recommendations for all ages.

These books are roughly sorted in descending order by the age group they were written for, but depending on your mood and the level of frights you want, any of these might do, regardless of your age!

After Stephen King, of course, The Devil All The Time by Donald Ray Pollock is a great choice to start with, not least because it was recently made into a film starring Tom Holland and streaming on Netflix. It focuses on a town full of corrupt and sinister characters, including a disturbed veteran, a husband and wife serial killer team, a false preacher, and Arvin, an orphaned young man caught in the middle.

 

A recent release worth trying for some chills is Sisters by Daisy Johnson. This haunting tale depicts two sisters who are very close — too close. They have recently relocated to an isolated house after a sinister event in their hometown. In their new life, as dread and unease rises in the house and in their relationship, the sisters’ darker impulses push them to the brink, and nothing will ever be the same.

 

If you’re looking for something more speculative, Deathless Divide by Justina Ireland might be the historical zombie novel for you. The sequel to 2018’s Dread Nation, it follows two young women traveling west in an 1880s America plagued by the restless dead. Jane and Katherine are looking for a safe haven, but find only more conspiracy, danger, and lies – not to mention the undead.

 

Another recent release worth trying – if you like scary clowns – is Clown In A Cornfield by Adam Cesare. Quinn and her father moved to a small, boring town to get a fresh start. But the town is struggling after the loss of their factory and its income, and has now divided into a conflict of adults vs. kids. This battle might destroy the town, so the town mascot (a creepy clown, of course) decides to eliminate the problem by getting rid of the troublesome kids for good.

 

After Neil Gaiman (of course), I’d recommend readers of middle-grade novels check out Thirteens by Kate Alice Marshall. It’s a recent publication, and it has echoes of both Stranger Things and Coraline. Eleanor, haunted by her mother’s disappearance in a fire, moves to too-perfect Eden Eld, where 3 children disappear every 13 years. This year, it’s her turn. It’s up to Eleanor and her two new friends to solve the mystery and save themselves before it’s too late.

 

This Town Is Not All Right is another middle grade read worth checking out. It evokes Stephen King, especially in the setting: it’s set in a  Maine fishing village, the very region Stephen King has made iconic in his books.  Twins Beacon and Everleigh, newly arrived with their father, can’t help feeling there’s something off about the town – even before Everleigh is recruited into the mysterious group The Gold Stars. Beacon must then find the chilling truth or risk losing his sister forever.

 

Finally, a personal favorite of mine: The Gates by John Connolly is a great spooky book for all ages, packed with humor, science, and (of course) terrifying evil. Three days before Halloween, precocious Samuel Johnson and his dog stumble onto his neighbors calling forth the devil in a flirtation with the underworld gone wrong. Now, the gates of hell could open, and only one eccentric little boy can stop it. This is a hilarious and thoughtful read, packed with action and some pretty complex ideas.

Other great authors of scary books include Dean Koontz, Jo Nesbo, Ruth Ware, Victoria Schwab, Leigh Bardugo, Ransom Riggs, Patrick Ness, Tamsyn Muir, Mary Downing Hahn, R.L. Stine, and K.R. Alexander.

Key Changes: New Pop Music

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Many times, the story of a musician’s career is a sad or depressing one. The pressures of fame and the struggle to stay relevant often have devastating consequences, especially when taken in conjunction with adolescence and young adulthood, which are difficult in their own right. For that reason, I’m always happy to see artists’ work reflect a more positive or healing trajectory. There are many musicians or groups whose growth I could talk about, but for now, here are two examples drawn from my own favorites.

Taylor Swift’s Folklore came out as a complete surprise to her fans, both because no one knew it was coming, and because the sound of these songs is so different from her recent tracks. Swift is a fascinating artist for me purely because you can never quite predict what she’ll do next. She refuses to be bound by a particular genre, always seeming to fit her sound to the personal story she wants to tell. She started out using country-inspired sounds on early albums such as Taylor Swift and Fearless, switching to a more mainstream pop sound with Red and 1989. In 2017, her album Reputation took a much darker tone, only to make a complete 180 to 2019’s Lover, which was much more bubblepop inspired. Now, she’s changed course again with Folklore, which features more acoustic, indie pop sounds as well as an imaginative, fantasy vibe.

Compared to Taylor Swift, Adam Lambert is less famous, but his growth as an artist, culminating in 2020 album Velvet, is equally compelling. A powerful vocalist, Lambert got his start on American Idol in 2009 and finished as runner-up. His first album, released later that same year, was titled For Your Entertainment and leaned heavily into a glam rocker vibe, flashy and energetic. In contrast, his next album, Trespassing, struck a much more muted, darker vibe, with less glam and more edge. The movement into darkness continued with The Original High, which featured many tracks with an emptiness theme – Ghost Town, Another Lonely Night, etc. As a fan, I was concerned that this indicated the stereotypical downward spiral of the rock star. However, around that same time, Lambert started touring with iconic album Queen, lending his showstopper voice to the band’s famous repertoire. This move was a big success, and the start of a new chapter for Adam Lambert as an artist. In 2019, he started releasing tracks from a new album, Velvet. In these tracks, the tone is much more hopeful, empowered, and renewed, with tracks like Superpower and New Eyes.

I could go on and on about how interesting it is to compare musicians’ most recent work with how they got their start – and honestly I might, stay tuned – but for now, my main takeaway from these albums is the feeling of hope and imagination. It tells me that things can get better, that we continue to grow and change through difficult times.

In Praise of Walking by Shane O’Mara

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Have you heard anyone say “sitting is the new smoking”? More and more we’re being told to get up and move, to try standing desks, anything to avoid sitting for long periods of our day. You may like this advice, or you may find it annoying or confusing, but the truth is that our bodies are built to move, in an intricate and fascinating system that we take for granted every day. In Praise of Walking, by Irish author Shane O’Mara, is an accessible, wide-ranging, and engaging overview of this issue.

O’Mara starts with an extremely motivating chapter on why walking is good for us to incorporate into our everyday lives, and then dives into the science of walking: how it developed in our species, the mechanics of movement, and what’s going on in your brain while you walk. He even presents the evidence that walking can aid in creativity, problem-solving, and socializing.

It would be easy for a book like this to be a personal memoir of walking and its healing powers, but this book was very evidence-based. Every statement made was supported by historical records and/or scientific studies. O’Mara works hard throughout the book to be transparent about his sources and where his recommendations are coming from, which makes the book as a whole more convincing for me. This did lead to some fairly technical scientific explanations, but he also included regular summaries in everyday language, which was a big help.

I personally love to walk and feel refreshed and renewed by being in nature, so it’s possible I’m biased in this case, but I found O’Mara’s explanations interesting, his evidence compelling, and his recommendations very motivating. Especially for curious readers and lifelong learners, the basic science presented in this book is a great way to learn something new about a practical topic.

Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie

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Mystery fans, rejoice! Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile, first published in 1937, is getting a new film version this October. The film acts as a companion film to the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express, directed by Kenneth Branagh (also based on a book of the same name). Like its predecessor, this Death on the Nile film will feature a star-studded cast and promises a thrilling interpretation of Christie’s original book.

In the original story, the famous detective Hercule Poirot is on vacation in Egypt when he is approached by heiress Linnet Doyle, who’s being plagued by a stalker. Troubled by the depth of the stalker’s hatred, Poirot finds himself onboard a cruise ship with the stalker, her victim, and the other troubled passengers, none of whom are telling the whole truth. As they journey up the Nile River, the danger mounts and Poirot races against time to discover which of the passengers’ secrets leads to murder.

I’m very excited about this movie, being a lover of mystery books as a genre and Agatha Christie in particular. I saw Murder on the Orient Express when it came out a few years ago, and it was enjoyable. However, Kenneth Branagh’s interpretation of Poirot doesn’t always work for me. While I always read him as mostly dainty and intellectual, Branagh plays Poirot as a dynamic and dramatic character with a troubled past. In the case of Death on the Nile, though, tangled morality and stormy emotions take center stage, so this version of Poirot might actually be more effective.

Whether you’re brand-new to Agatha Christie and her most famous character, or a devoted fan, this is a great opportunity to experience a great mystery story AND think about how storytelling changes when books are turned into movies. You can even compare the new film to an older film version, released in 2004, for the full experience. That’s what I’ll be doing – so stay tuned for my review!

Edinburgh, San Francisco, Dublin: Classic Novels of Place

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When life has me stressed, there are a lot of books I can’t read. Anything emotionally intense will only make me feel worse – which means my options for reading material narrow down a lot. Lately I  find myself taking a very particular prescription at times like these: what I think of as “novels of place”. These are books centered in one particular city or region, where the goal is to give a glimpse into the everyday lives of many people who live there. I love the opportunity to see how different people navigate their daily routines, and I like the immersion into a city I’ve never been to. Best of all, there’s not enough violence, romance, or angst to be intrusive. If you want to try this genre, here are a few of my favorites and why they work (for me).

44 Scotland Street by Alexander McCall-Smith launched a popular series, with the latest installment published in 2017. Set in Edinburgh, Scotland, the novel centers on the residents of the apartment building located at (you guessed it) 44 Scotland Street. The book opens when Pat, a twenty-year-old on her second gap year, moves out of her parents’ house and into a shared apartment in Scotland Street. Hijinks ensue as she meets her roommate Bruce, neighbor Domenica, and the family downstairs including 5-year-old prodigy Bertie. I like this book because it immerses you into all the good and bad things about living in Scotland, introduces you to realistic but quirky characters, and is liberally sprinkled with insightful comments on life, parenthood, attraction, and art. Most fascinating for me was the moral ambiguity of characters like Bruce the narcissist and Irene the pushy mother. I didn’t root for them, but I am intrigued enough to want to know what happens to them, and they make me think about self-awareness and what kind of person I want to be.

Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin is very similar to the Scotland Street series: it started as a serialized novel (published in installments in the newspaper), launched a popular series, and is centered on the residents of an apartment building. In this case, however, the setting is 1970s San Francisco, and the apartment building is 28 Barbary Lane. Also like Scotland Street, the book starts when a young woman moves into the building: Mary Ann Singleton, a young secretary from Ohio. This is where the similarity ends, however: Tales of the City leans fully into the bohemian diversity of the San Francisco scene, and the domestic dramas involve less art and politics and more intrigue and debauchery. This book has been on my to-read list for a long time, partly because of its unapologetic diversity, and partly because its soap-opera storylines are perfect escapist reading!

Scarlet Feather by Maeve Binchy is a favorite of both mine and my mother’s. Set in Dublin,  Ireland in the early 2000s, it follows Cathy Scarlet and Tom Feather as they open a catering business together and it completely transforms their lives. This book has more of a cohesive plot than some of the others, along with a good mix of warmth, humor, and domestic drama. While this isn’t part of a series, like the others, if you can’t get enough of Binchy’s Dublin, you can also read its companion novel featuring some of the same characters: Quentins. The best thing about Maeve Binchy’s work, as evident in these books as well as many of her others, is that despite the unfortunate things that happen to her characters – the doomed relationships and betrayals – there’s an equal measure of friendship, true love, and hope to balance out the scales. And isn’t that what we all want to know?

I think that’s the main draw of all these novels for me – the wholesomeness, the strong sense of community and friendship, and the sense that the world keeps turning through all the petty, inconvenient, or unpleasant things that happen. Life goes on, and given time people grow, change, and heal. Oftentimes healing and growth happens because of the people who walk alongside us: friends, neighbors, and even strangers. In some cases, we’re helped by animals, which leads me to my last recommendation: All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot.

Originally published in 1972, this is a true classic, but a perfect gentle read for the stressful times in life, especially for when you’re feeling lost. This biographical work tells the story of a young veterinarian who moves to the Yorkshire region of England to join a new practice. This rural, rugged region of England is full of unique characters, challenging terrain, and many animals. The young vet must treat livestock and pets alike while struggling to earn the respect of the locals. Despite the enormous challenges faced, the book shines with hope, humor, and deep love for animal life. If you’re an animal lover, this book (and its sequels) is a great choice.