JUNE 2024 READING LIST
Entering into the first month of summer I was finishing my ‘spring cleaning’ by painting the interior of my house and doing some much-needed clearing out of old things. As I was moving books around and culling my collection I created a stack of books to be my ‘to read then donate’ stack—books that I want to read but do not want to be part of my permanent collection.
I continued to listen to my cozy murder mystery and counted in my slow trek of reading through the presidential biographies. I included a newly published book in my reading that also happened to be non-fiction and balanced out the collection of books I read this month.
These are the books I read (or listened to) in June:
THE WAGER BY DAVID GRANN
A British vessel set sail with several other ships to challenge the Spanish Empire’s vast armada in the 1740s. It disappeared after rounding the South American cape and nothing was heard until a battered raft made it back to civilization and told a tale of brutalist tyranny, savagery and starvation. Seen as heroes the survivors basked in national glory until another ship arrived. Three sailors returned to active shores with a different tale. The men who had previously arrived were not heroes—they were mutineers.
First, I was captivated by the image used for the cover of The Wager. I particularly like it when books use art as a cover image. The colors of the front cover were also beautiful and captivating. Second, I appreciated Grann’s preface to the story. He briefly shared his research approach, where he found information and left the answer to the mystery undecided. He allows the reader to think for themselves leaving an opening for individual conclusions.
The book reads more like a non-fiction book in parts, especially when Grann is explaining the settings and environments. It was easy to picture the ports in England, the high seas on ship and the lands of South America with the facts and details he described. Then when people enter the story, Grann writes in such a way that I felt as though I was reading a novel.
There was also attention given to describing the factions that formed after the crew was lost from their flotilla and shipwrecked on a desolate island. Very reminiscent of Lord of the Flies, but instead of boys they are grown men who should be presumably old enough to forsake the more hideous nature of human survival. When sides are ultimately chosen and the two groups arrive back at the center of the English empire, there are again the two factions who attempt to not only sway king and commanders but also the public citizenry.
I enjoyed reading The Wager as I am a fan of historical occurrences that still have influence today. At the end of the book, Grann shares the different ways the story had been an inspiration to writers and brought about many much-beloved nautical stories that we consider classics. Two lines stuck out to me. One is the view of the English sailor about the native people who lived in the southern archipelago. The English had an inferior notion of the native people, even though the people knew how to hunt, live and thrive in such a hostile environment. Comparatively, those who washed ashore from His Majesty’s vessel turned to violence, theft, tyranny, murder and even cannibalism.
“By portraying the natives as both magnificent and less than human, Europeans tried to pretend that their brutal mission of conquest was somehow righteous and heroic.”
The other line lends itself more to the idea of how an empire is created. The victor indeed writes history, but more to the point of success is what the writers of history leave out. What are the tales and stories they choose to omit in order to maintain both power and prestige amongst the populace and to other nations?
“Empires preserve their power with the stories that they tell, but just as critical are the stories they don’t—the dark silences they impose, the pages they tear out.”
4/5 Stars
MURDER ON LENOX HILL BY VICTORIA THOMPSON
I listened to this book through Libby. Book seven in the Gaslight Mystery series. Sarah Brandt is asked by concerned parents to examine their teenage daughter in her capacity as a midwife. Their worst fears are confirmed their daughter, who is mentally a child herself, is expecting a baby. The avenue to how this could have come about leads Sarah and Frank Malloy to a local church where a minister who is a mentor to the youth in the community has a neurotic wife and secrets of his own.
This was by far the most gut-wrenching book of the series. I still enjoyed the mystery and the clever way Thompson builds suspense and ends chapters with cliffhangers, but the subject matter of the story was difficult. Then to have the main suspect suddenly die, was a great twist and only added to the mystery.
Trigger Warning: The book does not go into detail about the abuse that goes on but it does touch on abuse by a man of the church with children and abuse of a woman with a youth. If what happened in the catholic church with young boys or the case of Mary Kay Letourneau triggers something negative, I would not read this book.
4/5 Stars
MURDER IN LITTLE ITALY BY VICTORIA THOMPSON
I listened to this book through Libby. Book eight in the Gaslight Mystery series continues with Sarah Brandt visiting a family where a baby boy has recently been born. Cultures collide as the young Irish mother fights with her Italian mother-in-law. The next morning the young girl is dead and everyone in the house is a suspect, especially her new young Italian husband.
There was a lot of back and forth with this book as Thompson built up suspense around who was he culprit who killed the young woman. In the background was the growing tension between cultures and the possibility of a turf war between the Irish and Italian mobs. I didn’t start to unravel the mystery until toward the end.
After reading through more than half a dozen books, there has been a notable pattern in the culprits. Something about the pattern does cause me to find future stories more predictable, but I am hopeful Thompson brings on some surprises in the next few books.
4/5 Stars
WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT PRESIDENCY BY LEWIS L. GOULD
I made it the William Howard Taft in my presidential biography challenge. Based on the recommendations by Best Presidential Bios I decided to read a Taft biography by Lewis L. Gould and the Bully Pulpit by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Gould’s book focused solely on Taft in his presidency. Typically, I look for a biography that covers the president’s entire life, even their parent’s lives. The WHT Presidency was informative, but much of the information I read had already been supplied by Edmund Morris in his books about Theodore Roosevelt.
The writing was better than some biographies I have read. I truly believe no other biographies will come close to the dry dullness of James Monroe’s bio or the three books about Benjamin Harrison. Even so, this book was an ok read. I found myself reading through it quickly and gaining some insight, but wanting to learn more about why Taft made it into highest office and what nature and nurture led him to be the man that he was.
3/5 Stars
AN EMBER IN THE ASHES BY SABAA TAHIR
An Ember in the Ashes is a dystopian fantasy young adult novel with a setting similar to ancient Rome with the brutal Martial Empire. Part of the ferocious regime is a soldier, Elias, who wants to leave the blood and brutality of Blackcliff Academy behind. Laia, a lowly scholar, becomes a slave in the house of a fierce, ruthless woman. Their lives intertwine as the search for a new emperor begins and secrets long kept hidden become known.
I was drawn to the synopsis of this book with the idea the series would be a fusion of genres—historical fiction meets dystopian world. There are certainly elements of Romanesque rule, but the military rule of this book seems far more brutal. There is a strong plot invoking magic and fantasy that I was not expecting. Much of the book utilizes supernatural forces as elements of the story. Ghuls, ghosts, efrits and spirits appear in many different ways for good or evil.
I liked the competition parts of the book even if they felt somewhat reminiscent of The Hunger Games. The Trials each candidate had to go through were physical, psychological and emotional. I also enjoyed the layer of the story about the Resistance and how Laia and her family played a part in fighting against the Empire.
An Ember in the Ashes had many great lines. Some helped with the flow of the story and others provided great life lessons such as:
“Life is made of so many moments that mean nothing. Then one day, a single moment comes along to define every second that comes after. Such moments are tests of courage, of strength.”
A great line about guilt:
“There are two kinds of guilt: the kind that drowns you until you’re useless, and the kind that fires your soul to purpose.”
A powerful line about fear:
“Fear is only your enemy if you allow it to be. Too much fear and you're paralyzed. Too little fear and you're arrogant.”
Lastly, the line that sums up the book and essential a theme throughout the series:
“As long as there is life, there is hope.”
Another part of the book I liked was how Tahir wrote about each character. She would use descriptive words that were not the typical way to describe people.
“You killed my mother, who had a lion’s heart, and my sister, who laughed like the rain, and my father, who captured truth with a few strokes of a pen.”
She added words that invoked different senses rather than just descriptions. Some of the descriptions felt a little over the top when it comes to the more romantic scenes, but in comparison to other books, I withstood the scenes in this book far better.
Trigger Warning: The setting is of a brutal militarist regime. There are scenes with a lot of blood, master/ slave brutality and several scenes that either mention or have elements of rape. I typically have a tough time with some of the more brutal descriptions, but being that this was a young adult book the violent scenes were not as savage as some books for adults that I have read about the Vikings or the Assyrians.
4/5 Stars
favorite Quote of the month
Cover art: Willem van de Velde (II). A Ship on the High Seas Caught by a Squall, Known as ‘The Gust’, 1680. The Rijksmuseum