Book Review: The Heart Keeper by Alex Dahl

The Heart Keeper

The Heart Keeper by Alex Dahl, July 16, 2019, Berkley

Genre: thriller

Themes: heart transplant, obsession, mothers and daughters
Objective review: 4.5/5

My review: This thriller deals with mothers and their daughters and the volatile and contradictory feelings mothers can have. In the case of one woman losing her child, whose heart was donated to another child, feelings change, develop, and the loss might be almost too much to bear.

Intriguing, suspenseful, and heart breaking all at once.

This review is part of a book tour sponsored by Berkley, Penguin Random House, which provided the review copy. 

Sunday Salon: Exotic Environments for Three New Mystery Novels

Mysteries and cozies are more and more using exotic environments and atmosphere to appeal to readers who may want something different from the traditional settings - bookstore, library, specialty and candy shops, local tea and coffee shops, bed and breakfasts, or hotels, etc.

I  have three new mysteries with an African safari theme, a Singapore setting, and a Budapest-style, Hungarian tea house.


Love and Death Among the Cheetahs by Rhys Bowen, August 6, 2019, Berkley Books
Setting: 1930s England and Kenya
Georgie and Darcy are finally on their honeymoon in Kenya's Happy Valley, but murder intervenes (publisher)

Death in a Budapest Butterfly by Julia Buckley is the first Hungarian Tea House Mystery, publication July 30, 2019, Berkley Books. Hanna Keller runs her family's Tea House,  but when a customer keels over from a poisoned cuppa, Hanna and her tea-leaf reading grandma will have to catch a killer. (publisher)

Singapore Sapphire by A.M. Stuart is the first Harriet Gordon Mystery, August 6, 2019, Berkley, Harriet Gordon stumbles into a web of stolen gems and cutthroat thieves as she runs from her tragic past in a new historical mystery series set in early 20th century Singapore.  (publisher)

Memes: 

The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. Also,  It's Monday: What Are You Reading, and the Sunday Salon,  Mailbox Monday.

It's Monday: What Are You Reading?

Memes:  It's Monday: What Are You Reading, and Mailbox Monday.

The Pawful Truth by Miranda James, July 16, 2019, Berkley

Genre: mystery series

When Charlie Harris decides to go back to school, he and his Maine Coon cat, Diesel, find themselves entangled in a deadly lovers quarrel on campus (publisher)

The Ditch by Herman Koch, June 11, 2017, Hogarth Press

Genre: family drama, suspense

The bracing and inventive new novel of suspicions and secrecy from Herman Koch (publisher)

This was the only book that grabbed my interest the last time I visited the bookstore. That might change the next time I go, but for now this is my new read. It's different to me as I've never read any of Koch's books. Told by what seems an unreliable narrator, a man full of jealousy, who suspects his wife of having affairs with every other man she is in contact with. I can't wait to finish the book to see if he was right or just paranoid!

What are you reading this week?

Thriller: The Heart Keeper by Alex Dahl

Memes: The Friday 56. Grab a book, turn to page 56 or 56% of your eReader. Find any sentence that grabs you. Post it, and add your URL post in Linky at Freda's Voice. Also visit Book Beginning at Rose City Reader

The Heart Keeper

The Heart Keeper by Alex Dahl, July 16, 2019, Berkley

Genre: thriller

Themes: heart transplant, obsession, mothers and daughters

Book beginning:

ALISON 

I wake all the time; that is, if I sleep at all. The alarm clock projects the time onto the wall on Sindre's side of the bed and I lie staring at the pulsating dots separating the numbers. It's just after two o'clock in the morning and Sindre isn't here. He was here when I fell asleep. At least I think he was. I pull my hand out from underneath the warm duvet and stroke the cool, empty space where my husband should be. 

A few nights ago, the same thing happened....

Page 56:

ISELIN

I get up because I can't fall asleep in case the school rings, which I think they probably will - Kaia isn't used to being away from me, or to be around other children. 

I can't wait to read this new book. What do you think? 

Sunday Salon: Cozies and a Thriller

Booking the Crook by Laurie Cass, July 2, 2019, Berkley

Booking the Crook

Theme:
Librarian Minnie and her rescue cat, Eddie, solve crimes while they cruise around in a bookmobile in a town in Michigan. (publisher)

Bewitched and Betrothed

Bewitched and Betrothed by Juliet Blackwell, June 25, 2019, Berkley

Theme: In San Francisco, a family reunion keeps witch and vintage storeowner Lily Ivory on her toes as she prepares to walk down the aisle. (publisher)

Harry's Trees

Harry's Trees by Jon Cohen, June 12, 2019, Mira Books

Theme:  When his wife dies suddenly, Harry leaves his job and his old life behind and makes his way to the remote woods of northeastern Pennsylvania's Endless Mountains, determined to lose himself. But some people he meets there change his life for the better. 

Red Metal

Red Metal by H. Ripley Rawlings IV, July 16, 2019, Berkley Books

Theme: A Russian military strike against Europe could change the balance of power in the West. A stunningly realistic view of modern warfare from a battlefield commander  (publisher)

What books are on your reading list this week?

Memes: 

The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. Also,  It's Monday: What Are You Reading, and Stacking the Shelves. 

Rosie Colored Glasses by Brianna Wolfson: Book Beginning

Fiction: Rosie Colored Glasses by Brianna Wolfson, June 11, 2019, MIRA

Rosie Colored Glasses by Brianna Wolfson is a novel about young Willow, caught between the different worlds of her divorced parents, Rosie and Rex. According to the reviews, this is not a light read, as the description might suggest, but a semi-autobiographical novel about family dysfunction.

Book beginning:

PROLOGUE
Willow Thorpe knew friction. The heat it created when one thing rubbed against another. When one world rubbed against another.

Willow felt it every time she got into the back seat of her mother's car, buckled her seat belt, grabbed her brother's hand and prepared to return to her father's house. Every time she stared out the window of her mother's car and traced the familiar turns of the street on the way to her father's. Every time her father opened the big heavy front door and mumbled, "Late again, Rosie." Every time her mother casually responded with a smirk and a "Catch you later, Rex." 

 Page 56:

She guided Asher quickly down the aisles by his hand as Willow jogged and stumbled behind them. And then Rosie stopped in front of a giant wall of every color paint in every size bucket. 

Memes: The Friday 56. Grab a book, turn to page 56 or 56% of your eReader. Find any sentence that grabs you. Post it, and add your URL post in Linky at Freda's Voice. Also visit Book Beginning at Rose City Reader

Murder in Bel-Air by Cara Black: First Paragraph

Murder in Bel-Air by Cara Black, published June 4, 2019, Soho Crime

Murder in Bel-Air (Aimee Leduc Investigations #19)

Genre: mystery set in Paris

First chapter, first paragraph:

Paris. Late October 1999. Monday, Midafternoon

The young woman stumbled on the cobblestones in her worn shoes, fist in her pocket, clutching the steak knife she'd nicked from the cafe. She'd felt eyes watching - fear had charged up her back, impossible to ignore. Her gut had screamed at her to get out of there. 

Now. 

Why hadn't her contact showed?   

A car engine revved up, gears scraping. She glanced back and saw a black Renault slide onto Boulevard Picpus. Her heart pounded. 

Would you read on, based on the opening paragraphs?

Meme: I’d Rather Be At The Beach is the host for First Chapter First Paragraph on Tuesdays. Post the opening paragraph(s) of a book you are currently reading or planning to read.