Julie's Review: House Rules

Summary: Jacob Hunt is a teenage boy with Asperger's syndrome. He's hopeless at reading social cues or expressing himself well to others, and like many kids with AS, Jacob has a special focus on one subject--in his case, forensic analysis. He's always showing up at crime scenes, thanks to the police scanner he keeps in his room, and telling the cops what they need to do...and he's usually right. But then his town is rocked by a terrible murder and, for a change, the police come to Jacob with questions. All of the hallmark behaviors of Asperger's--not looking someone in the eye, stimulatory tics and twitches, flat affect--can look a lot like guilt to law enforcement personnel. Suddenly, Jacob and his family, who only want to fit in, feel the spotlight shining directly on them. For his mother, Emma, it's a brutal reminder of the intolerance and misunderstanding that always threaten her family. For his brother, Theo, it's another indication of why nothing is normal because of Jacob. And over this small family the soul-searing question looms: Did Jacob commit murder? Emotionally powerful from beginning to end, House Rules looks at what it means to be different in our society, how autism affects a family, and how our legal system works well for people who communicate a certain way--and fails those who don't. ~amazon.com

Review: Jodi Picoult is always good for plucking out a current issue and writing a book around the subject. House Rulesis no different as it concentrates on Asperger's Syndrome, which is on the Autism spectrum. We are introduced to 18 year old Jacob Hunt who has Asperger's and his family. Emma Hunt is a single mom since her husband walked out after Jacob's initial diagnosis. Theo Hunt is Jacob's younger brother that doesn't know what it's like to act like a younger brother.

While I enjoyed the book, I didn't love it. Believe me as a huge Jodi Picoult fan I wanted to love it. I liked all the characters but I didn't love them. I found Jacob profoundly funny at times and then I found extremely frustrating at others, which is no different that how his mom felt about him. I found the case interesting but I felt that the court case dragged on a bit and unlike most of her books, this ending left me with more questions than answers.

The book follows Picoult's typically successful formula but I don't think it worked as well with this book. Instead of getting a story about a family and their struggles with someone who is different; I felt that at times I was reading a book about Asperger's. Now I know the condition is critical to the story but at times it felt that the symptoms of Asperger's told the story instead of the reverse.

I did like the aspect of the forensic science playing an important part of the story. Jacob could definitely solve crimes but he wouldn't be able to identify with the victim or the victim's family.

I'm hoping that with her next book she moves away from her current formula and tries something new. Don't get me wrong I don't want her to totally abandon her style, maybe just tweak it. You already know that when you start her books and there's a sibling something serious is going on with them as well.

I will keep reading and buying Jodi because I do believe she's a gifted storyteller.

I also want to say that I'm not feeling the cover this time. Jacob is 18 in the novel, yet the boy on the cover seems between 8-10 years old. Doesn't seem to match the story.

Final Take: 3.75/5

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Trailer Official HD

Sent chills down my spine and brought tears to my eyes at the same time!

Can't wait!

Jenn's Review: The Liar's Lullaby

Summary: Tasia McFarland is a washed-up country-pop singer desperate for the break that will get her topping the charts again. The tabloids have raked over every part of Tasia's rocky life, following every high and low, her addictions, her breakdowns, her increasingly erratic behavior-and every broken relationship. The highlight of this lowlight reel: her failed marriage to an ambitious Army officer whose political talents earned him a spot in the nation's highest office. Tasia McFarland is the ex-wife of the President of the United States.
So when Tasia writes a song with politically-charged lyrics, people take note and her star begins to rise anew. In the spectacle-driven opener of her comeback tour, she is lowered into a stadium on a zip line and as helicopters fly overhead she fires her prop Colt 45 at the fireworks-filled stage. Tasia is riding high.

Until she's killed by a bullet to the neck, before the shocked crowd of 40,000.

When video can't prove that the shot came from Tasia's own Colt .45 and the ballistics report comes up empty, the authorities call on forensic psychiatrist Jo Beckett to do a psychological autopsy and clean up the potential political disaster. But as Jo sifts through the facts, she only finds more questions. Was Tasia's gun loaded? Did she kill herself in one last cry for attention? Were her politically-charged lyrics the rantings of a paranoid woman losing her grip? Or warnings from a woman afraid and in danger? For Jo, pouring over Tasia's past quickly becomes a race to extinguish the conspiracy rumor mill before it incites a level of violence that reaches America's highest corridors of power-and tears apart the very fabric of our nation.

Review: It's no secret that I'm a huge Meg Gardiner fan – both her Evan Delaney series and her Jo Beckett series. This is the latest installment in the latter and it does not disappoint!

Being a forensic psychologist has it's caveats. It can make you a target for grieving family and psychopaths, and in a high profile case such as this, stalkers, conspiracy nuts, killers, and government intimidation. Jo must investigate this case quickly and thoroughly as she is feeling pressure from all sides to wrap things up (and everyone's pushing for a different outcome) but records are missing, interviewees are uncooperative, or unavailable, and things just aren't adding up.

Gardiner's books are fast paced and detailed. Did I figure out the whodunit before Beckett? Yes, but that's because the reader is supplied with far more information than poor Jo. The fascinating part was having more pieces of the puzzle than Jo, and being able to get a hazy picture of the situation, but not being able to put all the pieces together. We need Jo's investigation to do that for us. And even with all of that, there were still twists and turns that surprised me. Gardiner, as always, also finds a way to alleviate some of the the intensity in the book by inserting levity in the form of wit, sarcasm, and in this case, revenge on a prying media hound.

Though her books are parts of a series, Gardiner also makes them stand-alone accessible –especially the Beckett series– but with most series, they're more enjoyable in order. Relationships and non-plot related conflict are left open, leading the reader into the next book.(The first book in the Evan Delaney series is China Lake. The first book in the Jo Beckett series is The Dirty Secrets Club.)

Gardiner's one of the few thriller authors whose books I can never put down. I suggest you pick her up.

5/5

Jenn's Review: Finger Lickin' Fifteen

Summary: RECIPE FOR DISASTER - Celebrity chef Stanley Chipotle comes to Trenton to participate in a barbecue cook-off and loses his head—literally.

THROW IN SOME SPICE - Bail bonds office worker Lula is witness to the crime, and the only one she’ll talk to is Trenton cop Joe Morelli.

PUMP UP THE HEAT - The reward for capturing Chipotle’s killers: One million dollars.

STIR THE POT - Lula recruits bounty hunter Stephanie Plum to help her find the killers and collect the moolah.

ADD A SECRET INGREDIENT - Stephanie’s Grandma Mazure. Enough said.

BRING TO A BOIL - Stephanie’s working overtime tracking felons for the bonds office at night and snooping for security expert Carlos Manoso, aka Ranger, during the day. Can she hunt down two killers, a traitor, and five skips, keep her grandmother out of the sauce, and solve Ranger’s problems and not jump his bones?

WARNING - Habanero hot. So good you’ll want seconds.

Review: There are mixed reviews of this book floating around out there which is why it took a year for this book to find itself on top of my To Be Read pile. Was I blown away by it? No, but frankly, I wasn't expecting to be. I picked it up for a nice light read with a good dose of humor, and that's exactly what I got.

I know Julie is sick or Stephanie never being able to make up her mind when it comes to the men in her life, but it doesn't bother me all that much. I think it's because I am not that invested in Stephanie as a character anymore. She's just a caricature. This wasn't always the case and I'm wondering when it happened (Was it the horrid 'between-the-numbers' books that divested my interest? I know it happened somewhere around book 12...) The series has certainly devolved a little, but not to the point of disaster.

All in all, there was nothing new in this book (cars exploded, shots were fired, Stephanie got covered in goop, FTA's were captured... eventually), but it was a good time visiting old friends, even if they are all crazy. I was laughing out loud at several points (Lula getting stuck out the window of an SUV being top on the list). It is a great summer read, as long as your not hoping for any romantic resolution...

3.5/5

Julie's Review: In The Woods

Summary: Irish author French expertly walks the line between police procedural and psychological thriller in her debut. When Katy Devlin, a 12-year-old girl from Knocknaree, a Dublin suburb, is found murdered at a local archaeological dig, Det. Rob Ryan and his partner, Cassie Maddox, must probe deep into the victim's troubled family history. There are chilling similarities between the Devlin murder and the disappearance 20 years before of two children from the same neighborhood who were Ryan's best friends. Only Maddox knows Ryan was involved in the 1984 case. The plot climaxes with a taut interrogation by Maddox of a potential suspect, and the reader is floored by the eventual identity and motives of the killer. A distracting political subplot involves a pending motorway in Knocknaree, but Ryan and Maddox are empathetic and flawed heroes, whose partnership and friendship elevate the narrative beyond a gory tale of murdered children and repressed childhood trauma. ~amazon.com

Review: I admit it: I started reading In the Woods and then put it down in favor of something else. I don't think I was in the mood for it. I will say that I'm so happy that I picked it back up to continuing reading it. It's a great, complex, well-crafted thriller/mystery/suspense, told through the eyes of Detective Rob Ryan. Rob is a complex character. He searches for the truth but he lies to us and himself. He's likable at times and other times I couldn't stand him. He was moody and irrational but yet you felt for him. You see he was left alive while his 2 best friends were apparently murdered in the woods near his house. He's blocked out the events but lives with tremendous guilt, even if he can't admit it to himself.

His partner is Cassie Maddox and she's got moxie. She's a wonderful character and not as flushed out as Rob but really In the Woods is his story. I'm sure we'll get to know Cassie more intimately in the next book, The Likeness. She and Rob are great partners in every sense of the word, except for physical intimacy..that they don't share. I loved the fact that this relationship was deep and yet still platonic. There was definitely a brother/sister vibe to it and even Rob states that as a fact as well. Since the book is told through Rob's eyes we really don't get to understand Cassie's point of view but as a reader you do feel that you know her as well as Rob.

For me the main plot was finding out what happened to Katy Devlin and what the motive was for her murder. The secondary plot was what happened to Rob, Peter and Jamie in those woods when they were younger. Early in the novel you are lead to believe that the two stories are intertwined and again this has to do with the fact that we are seeing it from Rob's POV and he desperately wants them to be linked so that he can solve the missing years of his life. I don't think I was ever on board with this line of thinking and as the book starts to wind down, you begin to see how they are or are not related to each other.

With any good suspense/thriller/mystery you are lead to believe one thing, get a twist that shoves you in another direction and then yet another twist pushing you back to either your original line of thinking or another direction. Ms. French definitely achieves that here. She kept me guessing all along whether what I was thinking was right or wrong. This is where I think how the author decides to write the point of view is extremely important. The plot and subplots work because it's told from Rob's and not from a 3rd person. We'd have a completely different book if it was told from Cassie's (not that I wouldn't mind reading that as well).

It took me a bit to get into this book but once I did I wanted to find out what happened to Katy and to the kids many years before. Ms. French is an expert at writing characters and painting them so vividly in your mind that they stick with you and reverberate. I will say that I did enjoy her writing style once I got used to her penchant for prose. The novel could have probably been about 50 pages less if it wasn't so descriptive at times. There were times when I felt that I was in Rob's head too much and it became burdensome.

If you like your crime thrillers/suspense books, then you should pick up and read In the Woods. I will be reading The Likeness very shortly and that focuses on Cassie. I look forward to getting to know her better and living in her head for a bit.

I thought this would be like Harlan Coben's The Woods and it was similar but yet very different.

Final Take: 4/5

Julie's Review: The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno

Summary: Inspired by a vintage circus photograph, Bryson's first novel tells the fictional story of the unusual relationship between two human curiosities from P.T. Barnum's American Museum. Bartholomew Fortuno, the world's thinnest man, is asked by Barnum to keep an eye on his latest acquisition—Iell Adams, the bearded woman, who is kept in seclusion until the impresario can introduce her to the world. Fascinated by her and desiring a transformative experience, Bartholomew falls hopelessly in love with Iell, much to the surprise of his fellow Curiosities. Bartholomew also gets caught in the middle of a war between Barnum and his jealous wife for control of Iell's future. The story culminates at Barnum's birthday party, where Bartholomew is shocked to discover Iell's big secret. Though thin on plot, this work sympathetically conjures up the backstage world of Barnum's museum and the pecking order of his Curiosities, and magically transports the reader back in time to Gilded Age New York. Fans of Water for Elephants are sure to want to enter this wondrous midway attraction of a novel. ~amazon.com

Review: What a perfect time to read The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno as I was going to NYC and that is where the book is set after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. We are quickly introduced to P.T. Barnum's American Museum and his "Curiosities". One of them is, Bartholomew Fortuno, "The World's Thinnest Man" and at 6' 60 lbs, he is definitely thin. He loves that he has a gift, it is what makes him unique and wondrous. He likes that he's a spectacle. He's made a comfortable life for himself at the Museum and is surrounded by friends and people like him. He's happy and content, until one night when Barnum brings a new woman into the threshold of the museum. This mysterious woman begins to shift the dynamics amongst the players. Relationships that were once solid become broken and people begin to change.

Bartholomew becomes obsessed with the new lady and her mysteries. He thinks that she is lovely and wonderful even though he's only had a couple glances at her. This is what begins him on the path to discover his real self. As much as the book is about the Museum, it's about one man's journey to self-discovery through his perceptions of himself, the people around him and the woman he begins to fall in love with.

I liked Bartholomew but I thought he was a bit naive at times and sometimes his behavior drove me a little batty but in the end I enjoyed his journey. The story is really his and his alone. The other characters just help him on his trip.

I didn't really care for Iell. I thought she was self-absorbed and coniving. I never felt that she really cared for Bartholomew the way he cared for her. I believe she was just using him to escape herself.

Ms. Bryson has an excellent way of making the characters jump off the page to you and in describing the museum. She also wrote Bartholomew in a way that you feel for him, you identify with him and he annoys you; much like a real person.

The book moves along at an even pace and slowly unfolds the secret. As the reader you find out things as Bartholomew does and have similar reactions to situations as he does. I will say that I did figure out a couple of the plot twists but it was nice to have my thoughts confirmed.

I would highly recommend this book if you are a fan of circus history, museum history and anything doing with NYC. The comparisons to Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen are understandable but I do think Water for Elephants is just a tighter woven story. That being said, I would definitely recommend that you pick up The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno to be transported to another time and place.

The book is out today; June 22, 2010

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of the book.

For more information on P.T. Barnum's American Museum, click here

To view the real people the characters were based on click here.
For a view of Manhattan during the time period, click here.

Final Take: 4.25/5