37. The Broken Girls by Simone St. James

listened on Libby
336 pgs.

2018
Adult Mystery 
Finished 4/2//2024
Goodreads rating: 4.07
My rating: 4.75
Setting: Two time periods:  1950 & 2014 Vermont

My comments: For some reason, it took me a long while to get into this book.  Maybe every time I started I was too tired to register what was going on because the first few vignettes were different people, different time periods.  And then, with some urging from a friend, I did get into it.  This is a wonderful, solid story with lots of surprises and a touch of magical realism.  A lot of mystery, a lot of sleuthing, and some very interesting characters made for a story that after that hard start I had a hard time putting down!

Goodreads synopsis:  Vermont, 1950. There's a place for the girls whom no one wants--the troublemakers, the illegitimate, the too smart for their own good. It's called Idlewild Hall. And in the small town where it's located, there are rumors that the boarding school is haunted. Four roommates bond over their whispered fears, their budding friendship blossoming--until one of them mysteriously disappears. . . .

Vermont, 2014. As much as she's tried, journalist Fiona Sheridan cannot stop revisiting the events surrounding her older sister's death. Twenty years ago, her body was found lying in the overgrown fields near the ruins of Idlewild Hall. And though her sister's boyfriend was tried and convicted of murder, Fiona can't shake the suspicion that something was never right about the case.

When Fiona discovers that Idlewild Hall is being restored by an anonymous benefactor, she decides to write a story about it. But a shocking discovery during the renovations will link the loss of her sister to secrets that were meant to stay hidden in the past--and a voice that won't be silenced. . . .

1. Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Torzs

listened on Libby

2023
416 pgs.
Adult Fantasy
Finished 1/2/24
Goodreads rating: 4.07
My rating: 4.5
Setting: contemporary VT, London, and Antarctica

My comments: Spells that are written in blood! Great settings (VT, London, Antarctica), mesmerizing story, cool plot, well-honed characters....what's not to like?

Goodreads synopsis:  Nominee for Best Fantasy (2023), Nominee for Best Debut Novel (2023)

In this spellbinding debut novel, two estranged half-sisters tasked with guarding their family's library of magical books must work together to unravel a deadly secret at the heart of their collection--a tale of familial loyalty and betrayal, and the pursuit of magic and power.

For generations, the Kalotay family has guarded a collection of ancient and rare books. Books that let a person walk through walls or manipulate the elements--books of magic that half-sisters Joanna and Esther have been raised to revere and protect.

All magic comes with a price, though, and for years the sisters have been separated. Esther has fled to a remote base in Antarctica to escape the fate that killed her own mother, and Joanna's isolated herself in their family home in Vermont, devoting her life to the study of these cherished volumes. But after their father dies suddenly while reading a book Joanna has never seen before, the sisters must reunite to preserve their family legacy. In the process, they'll uncover a world of magic far bigger and more dangerous than they ever imagined, and all the secrets their parents kept hidden; secrets that span centuries, continents, and even other libraries . . .

78. Too Bright to See by Kyle Lukoff

Book borrowed from CCLS

2021, Dial Book for Young Readers
188 pgs.
Mid Gr CRF
Finished 7/24/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.30 - 371 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: contemporary rural Vermont

First line/s: "It's strange living in our old house now that Uncle Roderick is dead."

My comments: It's very difficult to review this book without spoilers, but I feel it's very important to read it without knowing exactly what is going to happen.  It's written beautifully. From the beginning I knew I wouldn't be able to put it into my new school's library, being a Catholic School and all the problems that Catholics seem to have with anything LGBTQ.  I need this job, so I won't fight that externally, only internally.  And now, spoilers are coming, so if you have not read this book and even have the tiniest notion you might, do not read further.  Bug, the protagonist, goes through an incredible transformation of identity in the summer s/he turns 13 and is getting ready for middle school.  Bug has been born with female "parts," and has been raised as a girl.  He discovers the reason that he never really sees himself when he looks in the mirror, just a copy of himself.  He discovers so much more than that as well...that he is transgender and immediately begins referring to himself as HE instead of she.  Everyone in his life is so understanding, no one bullies him or makes him feel in any way awkward or uncomfortable, neither kids he's grown up with or administrators in the new-to-him middle school.  How I would like to very much believe this would be the reality for kids like him!  In one of the reviews I read about this book, Betsy Bird says that she thinks that some kids are just getting tired of books and movies full of bullying and meanness (my words/translation).  I sure hope she's right!  The afterword by the author is very enlightening, I'm guessing this story - or a big part of it - is autobiographical.  

Goodreads synopsis:  A haunting ghost story about navigating grief, growing up, and growing into a new gender identity

          It's the summer before middle school and eleven-year-old Bug's best friend Moira has decided the two of them need to use the next few months to prepare. For Moira, this means figuring out the right clothes to wear, learning how to put on makeup, and deciding which boys are cuter in their yearbook photos than in real life. But none of this is all that appealing to Bug, who doesn't particularly want to spend more time trying to understand how to be a girl. Besides, there's something more important to worry about: A ghost is haunting Bug's eerie old house in rural Vermont...and maybe haunting Bug in particular. As Bug begins to untangle the mystery of who this ghost is and what they're trying to say, an altogether different truth comes to light--Bug is transgender.

87. A Borrowing of Bones by Paula Munier

(#1 Mercy Carr & Elvis/ Vermont)/
listened to audio / Chirp
read by Kathleen McInerney
Unabridged audio (11:58)
2018 Minotaur Books
342 pgs.
Contemporary Adult Mystery/Murder Mystery
Finished 9/10/2019
Goodreads rating: 3.96 - 908 ratings
My rating:3.5
Setting: Contemporary southern Verment

First line/s:   "Grief and guilt are the ghosts that haunt you when you survive what others do not."

My comments:   Greatly enjoyed the setting, contemporary small town southern Vermont.  The two protagonists, a fresh-out-of-the-service in Afghanistan army vet female and a male Vermont game warden both own K-9 dogs and much of the story revolves around their partnerships.   Another central character, Mercy's grandmother, is the local vet.  It's just all a little to doggy for me.  It was an interesting mystery, though a little unbelievable in places.  I enjoyed listening to it.  It's the same narrator that reads the Kate Burkholder Amish mystery series, a wonderful reader.

Goodreads synopsis:  First in a gripping new mystery series about a retired MP and her bomb-sniffing dog who become embroiled in an investigation in the beautiful Vermont wilderness
It may be the Fourth of July weekend, but for retired soldiers Mercy Carr and Belgian Malinois Elvis, it’s just another walk in the remote Lye Brook Wilderness—until the former bomb-sniffing dog alerts to explosives and they find a squalling baby abandoned near a shallow grave filled with what appear to be human bones. U.S. Game Warden Troy Warner and his search-and rescue Newfoundland Susie Bear respond to Mercy’s 911 call, and the four must work together to track down a missing mother, solve a cold-case murder, and keep the citizens of Vermont safe on potentially the most incendiary Independence Day since the American Revolution.
          A Borrowing of Bones is full of complex twists and real details about search-and-rescue dog training that Paula learned through the training of her own dog. With its canine sidekicks and rich, dramatic story, this debut will be a must-have for mystery fans.

21. The Vanishing Stair by Maureen Johnson

#2 Truly Devious Trilogy
Listened on Audio
Read by Kate Rudd
Unabridged audio (9:13)
2019 Katherine Tegen Books
384 pgs.
YA Mystery
Finished 2/24/2019
Goodreads rating:  4.36- 3966 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary Vermont With Flashbacks to 1930s

First line/s: " 'Has anyone seen Dottie?' Miss Nelson asked"

My comments: I remember being extremely frustrated after finishing the first book because it left everything so incredibly up in the air. I think I feel even more frustrated after just now finishing this second installment. So unsatisfying! Decent mystery, especially since it’s YA and a good YA mystery is a bit unusual. I listened to this one and enjoyed all the “voices“ that Kate Rudd used except for that of Stevie, the protagonist. For some reason she used a very flat and expressionless tone for her, which didn’t suit the character at all....so that too was disappointing. A year to wait before the sequel comes out. I think I will include, below, a brief outline of the story and characters so that I can refresh my memory before reading book number three!

Goodreads synopsis:  All Stevie Bell wanted was to find the key to the Ellingham mystery, but instead she found her classmate dead. And while she solved that murder, the crimes of the past are still waiting in the dark. Just as Stevie feels she’s on the cusp of putting it together, her parents pull her out of Ellingham academy.
          For her own safety they say. She must move past this obsession with crime. Now that Stevie’s away from the school of topiaries and secret tunnels, and her strange and endearing friends, she begins to feel disconnected from the rest of the world. At least she won’t have to see David anymore. David, who she kissed. David, who lied to her about his identity—son of despised politician Edward King. Then King himself arrives at her house to offer a deal: He will bring Stevie back to Ellingham immediately. In return, she must play nice with David. King is in the midst of a campaign and can’t afford his son stirring up trouble. If Stevie’s at school, David will stay put.
          The tantalizing riddles behind the Ellingham murders are still waiting to be unraveled, and Stevie knows she’s so close. But the path to the truth has more twists and turns than she can imagine—and moving forward involves hurting someone she cares for. In New York Times bestselling author Maureen Johnson’s second novel of the Truly Devious series, nothing is free, and someone will pay for the truth with their life.

10. Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson

Truly Devious #1
listened to on Audible
2018 Harper Collins
432 pgs.
YA CRF/HF Time Flipping back and forth
Finished 1/22/2018
Goodreads rating: 4.16 - 838 ratings
My rating:  4.5
Setting:  Contemporary middle-of-nowhere Vermont

First line/s:  "Fate came for Dottie Epstein a year earlier, in the form of a call to the principal's office."

My comments:  Terribly mixed feelings about this book.  The ending drove me nuts, though I must admit I had a little bit of a clue about one part of it.  Some of the story dragged a bit, but it was a good mystery, and it was time for a good mystery.  At first I wasn't really sure whether I liked the protagonist, Stevie, but she grew on me.  I liked her uncertainty and her quirkiness and her totally obsessive love for crime-solving.  I loved her quick comebacks and her snoopiness - even though she didn't want to be snoopy she felt she had to be and couldn't stop herself.  More and more she felt like a real person to me.  She supposedly had anxiety, but that didn't really work for me.  And the ending did piss me off - I didn't know this was not a standalone.  Note to self:  it'll be awhile before the second book in the series comes out, so I need to make sure I either re-read this or read a really thorough summary of it before I read the next.

Goodreads synopsis: New York Times bestselling author Maureen Johnson weaves a delicate tale of murder and mystery in the first book of a striking new series, perfect for fans of Agatha Christie and E. Lockhart.          
          Ellingham Academy is a famous private school in Vermont for the brightest thinkers, inventors, and artists. It was founded by Albert Ellingham, an early twentieth century tycoon, who wanted to make a wonderful place full of riddles, twisting pathways, and gardens. “A place,” he said, “where learning is a game.”     
          Shortly after the school opened, his wife and daughter were kidnapped. The only real clue was a mocking riddle listing methods of murder, signed with the frightening pseudonym “Truly, Devious.” It became one of the great unsolved crimes of American history.
          True-crime aficionado Stevie Bell is set to begin her first year at Ellingham Academy, and she has an ambitious plan: She will solve this cold case. That is, she will solve the case when she gets a grip on her demanding new school life and her housemates: the inventor, the novelist, the actor, the artist, and the jokester. But something strange is happening. Truly Devious makes a surprise return, and death revisits Ellingham Academy. The past has crawled out of its grave. Someone has gotten away with murder.   
          The two interwoven mysteries of this first book in the Truly Devious series dovetail brilliantly, and Stevie Bell will continue her relentless quest for the murderers in books two and three.

61. Family Tree by Susan Wiggs

read on my Kindle
2016, William Morrow
368 pgs.
Adult "romance" CRF
Finished 11/3/16
Goodreads rating:  4.07 - 2,001 ratings
My rating: 3
Setting: Contemporary rural Vermont

First line/s:  "I can't believe we're arguing about a water buffalo."

My comments:   Okay.  This is definitely a "romance fiction."  Not my cuppa tea. At all.  That said, there were components of the book that I liked.  The way it was written, back and forth - from "now" to "then."  The setting, rural Vermont.  I liked the premise of coming out of a coma, of having brain injury, but I had mixed feelings about Annie's slow (and fast!) coming around after being asleep for a year. I am also not a cook, but I think all the cooking talk would be a huge plus for some. A quick, easy read...nothing to figure out, every scenario ending in pretty much the expected way.  A well-written romance for lovers of that genre.

Goodreads synopsis:  For readers of Kristin Hannah and Jodi Picoult comes a powerful, emotionally complex story of love, loss, the pain of the past—and the promise of the future.
          Sometimes the greatest dream starts with the smallest element. A single cell, joining with another. And then dividing. And just like that, the world changes.
          Annie Harlow knows how lucky she is. The producer of a popular television cooking show, she loves her handsome husband and the beautiful Manhattan home they share. And now, she’s pregnant with their first child.
          But in an instant, her life is shattered. And when Annie awakes from a year-long coma, she discovers that time isn’t the only thing she's lost.
          Grieving and wounded, Annie retreats to her old family home in Switchback, Vermont, a maple farm generations old. There, surrounded by her free-spirited brother, their divorced mother, and four young nieces and nephews, Annie slowly emerges into a world she left behind years ago: the town where she grew up, the people she knew before, the high-school boyfriend turned ex-cop. And with the discovery of a cookbook her grandmother wrote in the distant past, Annie unearths an age-old mystery that might prove the salvation of the family farm.
          Family Tree is the story of one woman’s triumph over betrayal, and how she eventually comes to terms with her past. It is the story of joys unrealized and opportunities regained. Complex, clear-eyed and big-hearted, funny, sad, and wise, it is a novel to cherish and to remember.

62. Tag Man - Archer Mayor

Joe Gunther #22
7 unabridged cds
2011 Minotaur Books
290 pgs.
Adult mystery
Finished 10/28/15
Goodreads rating:  3.79
My rating:  2.5
Setting: Contemporary Brattleboro, VT

First line/s:  "He sat in the center of the love seat, in the darkened bedroom, settled against the soft pillows behind him.  His hands, clad in thin cotton gloves, were folded in his lap; his feet, wrapped in blue surgical booties stretched out before the neatened coffee table before him."

My comments: A police procedural "murder mystery" set in contemporary Brattleboro, Vermont.  There were lots and lots of books in the series that came before this one, none that I'd read, but I had no problem at all following the characters or plot.  It was okay.  I don't know why I wanted more, but I did.

Goodreads Summary:  Someone is breaking into the homes of the rich, bypassing their high-tech security, their state-of-the-art locks and then making himself at home. The intruder doesn’t seem to steal anything except some food. At each break-in, he leaves the remains of his snack out and a Post-it note stuck next to the bed where the owners are sleeping. One word is written on the note: Tag.
Although the press loves him, problems begin for the elusive Tag Man when he removes some documents from the home of a mobbed-up man. Shortly thereafter, the danger increases when a trip through a beautifully furnished mansion turns up a secret basement room, where the Tag Man discovers a truly horrifying secret. Joe Gunther, struggling to recover from a devastating personal loss, leads his VBI team to untangle the many conflicting pieces of evidence, while the burglar himself struggles for survival in the no-man's-land between the police and the villains.

33. And the Dark Sacred Night - Julia Glass

Audio read by

13 unabridged discs

2014, Pantheon

400 pgs.

Adult CRF

Finished on the road between NM and IL 6/4/2014

Goodreads Rating: 3.63

My Rating: 3/It was okay

TPPL

Setting: Contemporary Vermont, NH, and NJ

My comments:  I didn't love this book, I didn't dislike it, some parts were really good and other seemed unneeded and uninteresting.  The book is broken into five sections from four different points-of-view.  The second part flew by and was totally enjoyable - maybe because this is one character that I really LIKED, but the other four dragged.  Good reader -  I listened to it while driving between New Mexico and Illinois.  Long drive.

Goodreads Review:  Kit Noonan’s life is stalled: unemployed, twins to help support, a mortgage to pay—and a frustrated wife, who is certain that more than anything else, Kit needs to solve the mystery of his father’s identity. He begins with a visit to his former stepfather, Jasper, a take-no-prisoners Vermont outdoorsman. But it is another person who has kept the secret: Lucinda Burns, wife of a revered senior statesman and mother of Malachy (the journalist who died of AIDS in Glass’s first novel, Three Junes). She and her husband are the only ones who know the full story of an accident whose repercussions spread even further when Jasper introduces Lucinda to Kit. Immersing readers in a panorama that stretches from Vermont to the tip of Cape Cod, Glass weaves together the lives of Kit, Jasper, Lucinda and ultimately, Fenno McLeod, the beloved protagonist of Three Junes (now in his sixties). An unforgettable novel about the youthful choices that steer our destinies, the necessity of forgiveness, and the surprisingly mutable meaning of family.

2. Lake Shore Limited - Sue Miller

Audio read by the author
2010
8 disks
288 pages
written for adults
Didn't like it (1)
Lovely writing; boring, tedious story; unlikable characters for the most part - it was a pretty endless, repetitive story.

Setting:  Post-9/11 Boston and rural Vermont.
OSS:  Four people connected to a young man who died on 9/11 tell the story of their lives and regrets a few years later.
The title:  The Lake Shore Limited is the title of the play that Billy writes, the catalyst for Billy meeting Sam, and the way that she is able to deal with the death of Gus and her feelings surrounding her own secret guilty feelings about Gus's death on 9/11.

The story weaves in, about, and around the lives of five people from the points-ov-view of four of them.  Gus, raised by his 15-years-older sister, is killed on 9/11.  So even though he is no longer alaive, he's definitely a huge part of the story.

Now, years later, Gus's girlfriend Billy, a playwright, has written a play abouit a husband whose wife might or might not have been killed in a train wreck.  The husband is not filled with grief, he's been having an affair and is not sure how he feels. This is actually a mirror of how Billy feels, she'd been about to break up with Gus, although no one else knows this., Leslie, Gus's sister, has invited her friend Sam to the opening of the play to meet Billy, to perhaps fix them up. Sam had once been in love with Leslie.  His first wife had died of cancer leaving him with three youngish sons, he had remarried and divorced after that. He's tall and good looking, Billy is extremely tiny and good looking.  The fourth voice is of Rafe, the actor who played the husband in the play, who is going though his own heartache - his wife is dying of Lou Gehrig's Disease.

Billy and her dog are particularly unlikable, Sam has incredible snobbish tendencies raise their ugly heads, and Rafe almost seems an unneeded character, I'm not sure why he was included.

I almost stopped listening to this a dozen times, but each time I convinced myself that I'd already spent enough time with it to complete it.  Yuck.  Endless.

74. The Day of the Pelican - Katherine Paterson

for: Middle and Upper grades
Clarion (H/M), 2009
$16.00
146 pages
Rating: Incredibly mixed: I loved learning more about the plight of Albanians in Kosovo, there's so little we really know and understand. Some of the storytelling was terrific, but there were places where I know that kids will just put the book aside. And some of the storytelling was just that - a narrator telling a story. I was profoundly moved by the plight of this family. I do love Katherine Paterson's writing. This didn't seem like her extraordinary writing though. It was more....ordinary. I feel guilty and mean saying this about a powerful author. But it's the feeling I'm left with....

Meli's family goes through unbelievable cruelties in the three years between living a comfortable life in their home in Kosovo, then taking very few belongings and fleeing to a remote mountain KLA hideaway, then to live in a tiny farmhouse with uncle, aunt, elderly granny, cousin and her three kids (14 of them in all, I think), to trudge for days without food or water to be thrust into a freight car, dumped on the Macedonia border and put into a refugee camp....to traveling to Vermont to a new life. Horrible injustices. So much hate. And killing. Cruelty. Subhumanity. And this is going on in many places in the world RIGHT NOW! The story ends shortly after 9/11, which is another huge blow to this non-practicing Muslim family.

When we look around and see immigrants, we must realize how much they've left behind to be here. Huge pieces of themselves left behind. Family and friends that will never been seen again. I'm almost speechless with sadness. What can I do to help?

Here's another review, from Twenty by Jenny. It includes an interview with Katherine Paterson and her editor about the writing of the book. Quite interesting.