Sunday Salon: Novels and Oral Storytelling

An Amish mystery novel, In the Land of Milk and Honey by Jane Jensen arrived this week, and I began reading it right away, interested in the setting in an Amish farming  community in Pennsylvania. The book is fiction but is written by an author who grew up in and lives in Lancaster County in Pa.

In The Land of Milk and Honey is the second in the Elizabeth Harris mystery series to be released August 2, 2016. Elizabeth Harris is a homicide detective who used to work in the NYPD, but who now works in Pa., living with her boyfriend, a former member of the Amish community.

Elizabeth is called in to help solve the mystery of the overnight death of an Amish family who seemed to have succumbed to the flu, but whose milk cows are also found to be sick and dying. I am in the middle of the novel and can't wait to find out what  and who is causing the deaths and sickness that is spreading in the Amish community.

A new galley on my desk, PhDeath, is a thriller by an author who has recommendations from writers and critics such as Pico Iyer and the author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig. This is making me very anxious to read the book, the first of the Puzzler Murders by James P. Carse. It will be released September 15, 2016 by Opus Books.

The Kingdom: a Novel  by Fuminori Nakamura was published July 12, 2016 by Soho Press. I posted a review on July 16. I enjoyed this noir thriller, set in the Tokyo underground, that had me rooting for its unconventional main character.

It has been so hot these past few weeks! We spend four days in Kansas City where it was just as hot as here at home, if not more. The highlight of the trip for me was not only the perfect air conditioned room with its brand new furniture and decor in the renovated hotel, but attending a pre-conference "concert" of the National Storytelling Conference held at the hotel by the National Storytelling Network. We listened to five experienced storytellers, at least two of whom brought us to tears with their stories and dramatic performances. Storytelling certainly is a very creative artform.

Are any of you oral storytellers as well as readers and writers?

Welcome to the Sunday Salon where bloggers share their reading each week. Visit The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer.
Also visit It's Monday, What Are You Reading? hosted by Book Date.

Noir Novel: The Kingdom by Fuminori Nakamura, a review

The Kingdom: a Novel by Fuminori Nakamura was an excellent, shorter read. A noir novel with a young woman in dangerous circumstances who nevertheless has you rooting for her. I read it over a month ago and plan to read it again in the future. It was published July 12, 2016 by Soho Press.

Book description: Yurika is a freelancer in the Tokyo underworld. She poses as a prostitute, targeting powerful and high-profile men whom she drugs and takes incriminating photos to sell for blackmail purposes. She knows very little about the organization she’s working for, operates alone and lives a private, solitary life.

But when a figure from Yurika’s past emerges, she realizes there is someone out there who knows all her secrets. Yurika finds herself trapped in a game of cat and mouse. Is she wily enough to escape one of the most sadistic men in Tokyo?  (publisher)

First paragraphs:

When did I realize I would never get what I wanted most? 

Maybe I was in my twenties. Or maybe I was a child, just old enough to make sense of the world. Back when I did nothing but glare at everyone around me, what I wanted most was far away. It was not something tangible.It made my skin burn. It ignored all the rules. It went beyond morals and reason. It was something that could overturn the foundations of everything I thought my life would become. I wonder if I still want it. What would I do if I get it?

My comments: Yurika is a sympathetic character in spite of her job entrapping well-known or wealthy men in sexual situations for blackmail purposes. Though she is not directly involved in the blackmail per se, she makes her living by following orders as a free lance character working for a criminal underworld.

When things begin to catch up with her and her life becomes dangerous because of Kizaki, who comes into her life, we easily root for Yurika to save herself and get out of danger, to even thrive and come out on top of the underworld that wants to keep her in.

An excellent read, a likeable character, and an intriguing plot. I've also enjoyed Nakamura's other noir novels, The Thief and Evil and the Mask. 

Sunday Salon: Winter's Last Hurrah

Welcome to the Sunday Salon where bloggers share their reading each week. Visit The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer.
Also visit Mailbox Monday, and It's Monday, What Are You Reading? hosted by Book Date. 

Snow surprised us this morning, as almost eight inches fell overnight. It was very picturesque while it lasted, but the sun came out later and melted much of it from the trees and sidewalks. It may have been winter's last hurrah, at least we hope so. 

New books for review, a variety of genres:

Wedding Girl by Stacey Ballis, to be released May 3, 2016 by Berkley
Top pastry chef Sophie Bernstein and her sommelier fiancé were set to have Chicago’s culinary wedding of the year…until the groom eloped with someone else in a very public debacle, leaving Sophie fifty grand in debt on her dream wedding and then losing her job and her home…. Sophie moves in with her grandmother, Bubbles, and looks for a new career.
The Kingdom by Fuminori Nakamura, to be released July 12, 2016; advance uncopyedited edition from Soho Press. A noir novel about a freelancer in the Tokyo underworld who blackmails for an unknown organization for her living, until someone discovers her secrets. 
Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll, published April 5, 2016 by Simon & Schuster. 
Ani FaNelli is the woman you love to hate. The woman who has it all. But when Ani's immaculate façade begins to crack, she soon realises that there's always a price to pay for perfection.
And After the Fire by Lauren Belfer, to be released May 3, 2016 by Harper.  A novel inspired by historical events—about two women, one European and one American, and the mysterious choral masterpiece by Johann Sebastian Bach that changes both their lives.
The Summer Guest, historical fiction by Alison Anderson, tp be released May 24, 2016 by HarperCollins. Blinded by a fatal illness, young Ukrainian doctor Zinaida Lintvaryova is living on her family’s rural estate in the summer of 1888. When a family from Moscow rents a cottage on the grounds, Zinaida develops a deep bond with one of their sons, a doctor and writer of modest but growing fame called Anton Pavlovich Chekhov.
LaRose by Louise Erdrich, to be released May 10, 2016 by Harper. A contemporary tale of a tragic accident, a demand for justice, and a profound act of atonement with ancient roots in indigenous culture.

Contemporary fiction, thrillers, and historical fiction - a lot to read this spring!
What's on your reading desk this spring?