62. The Other Family by Loretta Nyhan

Listened on Audible
narrated by Mary Robinette Kowal  (who is excellent, does different voices really well)
Unabridged audio (8:56)
2020 Lake Union Publishing
285 pgs.
Adult CRF
Finished 4/9/2020
Goodreads rating:  3.71 - 3802 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary Chicago suburb

My comments:  An intense look at a family that hits you from all different directions.  Solid setting in a Chicago suburb.  Excellent reader (she does different voices really well).  Two parents nearing the end of divorce proceedings.  A sweet 10-year-old daughter who has spent her life dealing with a debilitating series of food allergies.  A grandmother who fiercely protects her adopted daughter.  A just-discovered aunt, full of love and family history and her own extended family including Indian husband, black foster daughter, and 90-year-old best friend.  Throw in a bridal boutique for older women, a school board election, a woo-woo hippie doctor, and even a tiny bit of online dating and ....voila....you've set the scene for a very interesting story.  Quite memorable.

Goodreads synopsis:  From the bestselling author of Digging In comes a witty and moving novel about motherhood, courage, and finding true family.
          With a dissolving marriage, strained finances, and her life in flux, Ally Anderson longs for normal. Her greatest concerns, though, are the health problems of her young daughter, Kylie. Symptoms point to a compromised immune system, but every doctor they’ve seen has a different theory. Then comes hope for some clarity.
          It’s possible that Kylie’s illness is genetic, but Ally is adopted. A DNA test opens up an entirely new path. And where it leads is a surprise: to an aunt Ally never knew existed. She’s a little wild, very welcoming, and ready to share more of the family history than Ally ever imagined.
          Coping with a skeptical soon-to-be-ex husband, weathering the cautions of her own resistant mother, and getting maddeningly close to the healing Kylie needs, Ally is determined to regain control of her life. This is her chance to embrace uncertainty and the beauty of family—both the one she was born into and the one she chose.

65. The Simple Wild by K. A. Tucker

listened on Audible borrowed from CCLS
read by Rebekkah Ross
Unabridged audio (12:34)
2018 Atria Books
388 pgs.
Adult CRF
Finished  7/20/2019
Goodreads rating:  4.46 - 11,857 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary Bethel (Bangor), Alaska

First line/s: (from Chapter One, not the prologue)  "That calculator's not mine."

My comments:  The narrator, Rebekkah Ross, read this beautifully.  The setting, in the tundra near Bethel, Alaska (But called Banger) was as well done as the large handful of well-drawn characters.  I do appreciate a character driven story, which this was -- a contemporary, well-crafted sotry with just enough romance, full of humor and heartbreak.  I didn't think that I really cared very much about the protagonist at first, because i was judging the inner Calla by merely looking at the outer Calla, but that didn't last more than about a quarter of the book.  I guess you can say I ended up loving it, through the laughter and the tears.

Goodreads synopsis: Calla Fletcher wasn't even two when her mother took her and fled the Alaskan wild, unable to handle the isolation of the extreme, rural lifestyle, leaving behind Calla’s father, Wren Fletcher, in the process. Calla never looked back, and at twenty-six, a busy life in Toronto is all she knows. But when Calla learns that Wren’s days may be numbered, she knows that it’s time to make the long trip back to the remote frontier town where she was born.
          She braves the roaming wildlife, the odd daylight hours, the exorbitant prices, and even the occasional—dear God—outhouse, all for the chance to connect with her father: a man who, despite his many faults, she can’t help but care for. While she struggles to adjust to this rugged environment, Jonah—the unkempt, obnoxious, and proud Alaskan pilot who helps keep her father’s charter plane company operational—can’t imagine calling anywhere else home. And he’s clearly waiting with one hand on the throttle to fly this city girl back to where she belongs, convinced that she’s too pampered to handle the wild.
          Jonah is probably right, but Calla is determined to prove him wrong. Soon, she finds herself forming an unexpected bond with the burly pilot. As his undercurrent of disapproval dwindles, it’s replaced by friendship—or perhaps something deeper? But Calla is not in Alaska to stay and Jonah will never leave. It would be foolish of her to kindle a romance, to take the same path her parents tried—and failed at—years ago. It’s a simple truth that turns out to be not so simple after all.

12. Run You Down by Julia Dahl

#2 Rebekah Roberts
read on my iPhone
2015 Minotaur Books
287 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery
Finished 1/26/19
Goodreads rating: 3.76 - 1344 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary NYC and Roseville, NY, just north of NYC

First line/s: "Florida was not what I imagined.  There was no ocean where your father lived, that was the first thing."

My comments: (I wonder why, of all the possible titles this could be given, they decided on this?)  I don't remember much of the nitty-gritty of what happened in Invisible City, but I remember I liked it a lot.  Therefore, I read this book almost as a standalone.  There were a number of things that bothered me, but they didn't bother me enough to lower my rating.  The close connection - and I do mean close - between reporter Rebekah and the people of her news story was soooo impossible, but I didn't care.  I didn't mind switching back-and-forth between Rebekah and the mother who had abandoned her 20 years before, other than in a couple of places that information was revealed by Aviva and I attributed that information to Rebekah having known those details, so that was a little confusing until I figured it out.  It was an interesting story, perhaps unbelievable in spots but for some reason I didn't care.  I really enjoyed it, and the peaks into the strict Orthodox Jewish community,

Goodreads synopsis:  Aviva Kagan was a just a teenager when she left her Hasidic Jewish life in Brooklyn for a fling with a smiling college boy from Florida-and then disappeared. Twenty-three years later, the child she walked away from is a NYC tabloid reporter named Rebekah Roberts. And Rebekah isn't sure she wants her mother back in her life.
          But when a man from the ultra-Orthodox enclave of Roseville, N.Y. contacts Rebekah about his young wife's mysterious death, she is drawn back into Aviva's world. Pessie Goldin's body was found in her bathtub, and while her parents want to believe it was an accident, her husband is certain she was murdered.
          Once she starts poking around, Rebekah encounters a whole society of people who have wandered "off the path" of ultra-Orthodox Judaism-just like her mother. But some went with dark secrets, and rage at the insular community they left behind.
          In the sequel to her Edgar Award finalist Invisible City, Julia Dahl has created a taut mystery that is both a window into a secretive culture and an exploration of the demons we inherit.