Bellweather Rhapsody by Kate Racculia is the perfect book to curl yourself around on a cold, windy winter weekend. If I had the time, I would have read it in one day. As it was, it took me a couple of weeks to read this novel, and I don’t deny that a huge part of the appeal of coming home for lunch, on days I could manage it, was that I would get to unpeel another layer in this fun, creepy, murder mystery/coming-of-age novel.

The year is 1997. Take a pair of musically gifted, high school twins: add in a regional music competition at a crumbling old gothic hotel, a fanatical, crazed conductor, a handful of flawed characters, an impending blizzard, and you’ve got yourself one rollicking good time. The depth of some of the characters and their private agonies and joys surprised me, as did the general snarky tone and the reveal-upon-reveal as the story plays out. Teenaged Rabbit Hatmaker may just be my favorite character of the year, as he faces his inner self and tentatively (and then competently) stretches to come out of the comfortable little shell in which he has lived in his sister Alice's shadow.

The book starts out with gusto: fifteen years into the past, a young girl attending a wedding at the hotel wanders off and accidentally chances upon a fresh murder scene in Room 712 – a new bride has shot her husband and then hung herself. Strap yourself into a seatbelt as this story takes off from a variety of angles and then manages to (mostly) wrap up the loose ends. You'll enjoy the late 90s references from the novel's setting, and you'll also wonder when Racculia’s next book is coming out.

I've read a few books since my last post. Here we go:

The tagline for Ken Grimwood’s Replay reads: What if you could live your life over again? And over again? And over again? This is a time travel novel that will appeal to those of you who have pondered how useful it might be to be able to go back to a certain date or year and to use known historical events in one’s favor. The protagonist, Jeff, is an unhappily married 43-year-old who is considering leaving his wife when he suddenly has a heart attack. As he fades out of consciousness, he realizes that he has missed on out all of life’s opportunities and that he’s just simply going to die without ever leaving a mark on the world.

Instead, however, he wakes up in his college dorm room as an 18-year-old, and gradually comes to understand that he’s been given a second chance to live his life all over again. Jeff tries to live his former college lifestyle for a brief time, but quickly abandons studying when he sees that he could make a tremendous amount of money by making bets on sporting events and at casinos. This new life is wildly different than his previous one, and when he begins to think he’s learning how to be happy again, he had another heart attack, again rues all of his past mistakes, and winds up waking up at college again. Instead of finding himself in his dorm room bed again, he reawakens on an outing with friends, a time that occurred just a bit later than when he originally awakened in his room…what does the lapse in time mean, and has Jeff been given another chance?

I’m a sucker for time travel books. Jeff is an appealing character, and is also in many ways very sexist, as evidenced by his behaviors. With the passage to time, and time traveling, Jeff learns to evolve emotionally. I thoroughly enjoyed the story and hated to see it end. If you enjoy time traveling scenarios, check out the classic Time and Again by Jack Finney (you’ll never think about New York City the same way) or Kate Atkinson’s haunting Life After Life, wherein the heroine lives her life multiple times in strands that always seem to be cut short just as she’s learning how to manage her life and circumstances.

I just couldn't put down The Martian by Andy Weir and I read it in one day. Space stories are the modern take on the Western and I love both genres equally.

The basic story is this: an astronaut and his team are investigating soil samples on Mars when a sudden dust storm sweeps them away from their station. One of them, Mark Watney, appears to be gravely injured. The commander manages to get the rest of the team to the transport and back to their ship, the Hermes. They head home, filled with sadness for the loss of the fun, intelligent, and irreverent botanist they left behind. Mark wakes up and while he is indeed injured badly, he manages to get into their temporary station, the Hab, and to clean up and stitch his wounds.

Then the reality sets in. Hermes is gone. Another scheduled fight to Mars won't happen for years. Mark has enough food to last him 400 days. Then, he'll slowly starve to death. Mark immediately begins assessing how he might survive, and with MacGyver-like skills, he starts making decisions and taking actions that will give him the best odds for survival. He is extremely resourceful, and also has an incredibly snarky sense of humor that helps him cope. Being a botanist comes in handy, because he quickly figures out how he can grow a potato crop in the Hab. Will he figure out how to communicate with Earth to let them know he is still alive? Will he be able to survive the extreme cold on Mars? What will it take for one man facing certain death to rise up and fight with every fiber of his being? This book is a hell of a fun ride. Just be prepared to ignore everything else going on because you'll want to find out what is happening to Mark each time he shares a new journal entry. Shamelessly, I hope this one gets made into a film!

Thornwood House by Anna Romer takes place in the 2006, and involves single-mother Audrey and her daughter, 11-year-old Bronwyn. They have recently inherited an old, weatherbeaten home in rural Queensland, and decide to move there as an adventure. While there, Audrey confronts both her own past (her daughter's father never wanted to marry her, and he also later committed suicide), and also the past lives of the inhabitants of the house. Audrey uncovers some nasty secrets that cause trouble for her and Brownyn, and she starts wondering if making the move to Thornwood House was big mistake. This modern gothic story includes suspense, murder, and a bit of romance. It is very entertaining, and would make for a terrific beach or vacation read.  

The idea of losing a sibling is unbearable. How then, might a twin feel when she loses her sister, who is her very soul, and deals with that loss by recreating all of the horrible actions that led to the sister's downfall and death?

Her by Christa Parravani is a memoir, and a painful one to read. I had to put it down a few times because the emotions were so raw and challenging.

Christa always loved Cara more than anyone else. Cara was her lifeboat in an shaky, dysfunctional family situation. When Cara got married, Christa thought she'd die of sadness, yet the twins still managed to be present in each other's lives. A horrible crime besets Cara, and she is simply never the same as her life spirals out of control. Christa does everything within her power to help her sister, and the eventual loss of Cara nearly kills her.

Christa is an amazing photographer and you can see photos of her and Cara that she took over a period of years when they were young adults. They are also featured on the cover. This memoir is redemptive and ultimately uplifting, but what a tough, tough journey the author traveled to get to that point. Emotionally exhausting.