Mr. Dickens and His Carol by Samantha Silva (FIC Sil)

His wife is upstairs in the throes of childbirth (their sixth child) when Charles Dickens receives his publishers.  Somewhat taken aback by the sounds coming from above them, they never-the-less deliver the bad news:  Dickens' latest book, The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, is a dismal failure.  The publishers are threatening to invoke a clause in his contract which would force Dickens to pay them a monthly fee.  UNLESS Dickens can produce a book about Christmas by the week before.  It doesn't have to be a big book, a novella will do just fine.

Dickens finds himself faced with financial ruin (why is it that everyone in his family from his wife to his children to his father to his brother thinks that he is a bottomless money pit?).  And then there's the toy store owner to which his children drag him.  And all the street urchins, whose cause he has championed.  How can he admit that his funds are so low he can't even give them a farthing?

And then there's the disdain of his writing peers.  It can't be true that William Thackeray is more popular than Dickens?  That Anthony Trollope and Wilkie Collins hold him in less than high regard?  

When his wife leaves him in anger to visit her family in Scotland, Dickens is left to find his way through his anger and despair and the writers' block that has him, well, blocked.  His deadline is approaching and all he can think about is how much everyone has taken advantage of him.  Hardly the best of moods to be in to write a book about Christmas.

And then one night, while walking his way through London, he meets Eleanor Lovejoy.  Lovely and thoughtful, calm and peaceful, she becomes his muse and just maybe the way through his funk.

I don't know how much truth there is in this work of fiction but I found it completely delightful.  Dickens is engaging and personable with a personality larger than life.  I wanted to meet him and hang out with him as, according to this version of his life, did all of London.  So much did I like Dickens that I found myself thinking about actually reading one of his books.  Well, maybe not...

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Artemis by Andy Weir (SF Wei)

Jazz Bashara is a smuggler and small-time operator - in the city of Artemis, only city on the moon.

All she wants is to be rich enough to pay off a big debt.  So when a somewhat shady but very wealthy fellow citizen offers her the chance to earn a million slugs (the local currency), her ship has come in.  Or so she thinks.

But when things go wrong, Jazz must rely on skills she didn't know she had to save not only herself but the city she loves.  In the process, she discovers that she has friends, a lot of knowledge about a lot of things, and that she is a very good criminal.

I'm not much of a science fiction fan.  In library lingo, it's usually classified as "Science Fiction and Fantasy."  I come down on the "Fantasy" side of the equation.  But I do like Andy Weir's books which might have a little fantasy but are definitely science fiction.

He has created a whole new world in this book.  And what a world it is!  Much of the science was over my head so I will admit to reading portions of it quickly.

At its heart, this book is both a crime caper and a coming of age novel.  The crime caper part kept me reading and the coming of age part gave it heart.  Jazz is a smart aleck, no doubt about it, but one worth rooting for.

A thoroughly enjoyable book.

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Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak FIC Hor

It's Christmas and oldest daughter, Olivia, is coming home to celebrate for the first time in several years. Good news, right?  Except that Olivia has been treating Haag (read: Ebola) patients in Liberia and must spend a week in quarantine as soon as she arrives.  And she can't spend it alone.

Over the course of the book we meet the Birch family:  Father Andrew who is a restaurant critic and who has just received an email from the son he never knew, mother Emily who is keeping her recent cancer diagnosis a secret, oldest daughter Olivia who under no circumstances can let anyone know how close she became to another doctor who is now suffering from the dreaded virus, and youngest daughter Phoebe who has recently become engaged after a six-year courtship and is obsessed with planning her wedding.

Over the week of the quarantine, we come to know all of the Birches in all their good and bad.  Often not likable, they are still human in their foibles and worth rooting for.  If occasionally I wanted to crack their heads together, there were other times when I cheered them on and was glad of their gradual steps back to being a family.

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Origin by Dan Brown FIC Bro

Some people might find this book to be too much like previous books - and it has similarities but I didn’t care about that because I found it interesting and entertaining.  Robert Landon is back! One of his former students, Edmond Kirsch, has invited him to come to Spain for an announcement that will turn religion upside down. Kirsch is well known as a brilliant, rich scientist who is also a futurist.  To unveil his announcement he has invited a select group of people to come to the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. Kirsch has created a multimedia presentation that blows the minds of all of those present.  He has also made sure that millions of people will be listening to his presentation on social media.

But before the finale there is violence and Kirsch’s discovery may remain a secret.  It is up to Landon with the help of a beautiful woman and Winston, a computer unlike any other, to find out who is behind the violence and how the presentation was supposed to end.

The background of the science and religion was fascinating to me.  If you liked his previous books I think you will like this one too!

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Odd Child Out by Gilly MacMillan FIC Mac

Sometimes friends are total opposites.  That was true for Noah and Abdi.  They are both teenagers who attend a private school. Noah  has lived a privileged life but that doesn’t really matter so much when you are diagnosed with cancer at a young age.  Abdi may be at the same school but he is there as a scholarship student. Together they have developed a strong friendship based on their competitive natures (school and chess - not sports!).

Jim Clemo is a detective who is finally being released from therapy to go back to work.  During his last case a young boy died and Jim has blamed himself and that led to serious depression and insomnia.  His first case back includes Noah and Abdi.  During the early hours of a cold night Noah was fished out of a canal by a scrapyard.  He is in critical condition.  Abdi was found on the side of the canal.  He isn’t hurt but appears to be in shock from the trauma.  Clemo needs to find out what happened and to do that he needs to question Abdi - but he isn’t talking.  The case will affect the city as tension over immigration explode.

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Swimming Lessons by Claire Fuller FIC Ful

When I finished this book I immediately looked up this author on the Library’s website to see if I could get Fuller’s previous book - I’ll start it tonight!

Gil Coleman has been a professor and a one-hit wonder author.  He married Ingrid and they had two daughters, Flora and Nan.  For years Ingrid wrote letters to her husband about their marriage - the truth as she knew it.  She didn’t give them to Gil.  Instead she hid them in books.  Gil has collected thousands of books over the years and what he loves about them is finding notes or doodles in the margins and pieces of paper left in them.  After the last letter was written Ingrid went down to the beach (as was her daily habit) - but she never returned and no trace of her was found.  It devastated her daughters who still miss her and hope for her return.

It’s been 12 years since Ingrid has disappeared.  As Gil is going through old books in the upstairs of a bookstore he looks out the window and thinks he sees Ingrid.  He rushes to get to her but he falls and ends up in the hospital.  Flora and Nan try to work together to take care of Gil after they find out he is quite ill and becoming senile also.  Slowly throughout the book we are taken back in time by reading the letters that Ingrid wrote.  They are interspersed with the present day story.

This book was not your run-of-the-mill book!  I loved it.

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Pieces of Happiness by Anne Ostby FIC Ost

From out of the blue, four high school friends receive a letter from Kat, another friend, who has invited them all to join her in Figi and live with her on her cocoa farm.  Maybe they'll just sit and talk and relive old times.  Maybe they'll actually do something with all the cocoa on her farm.  And maybe none of them will want to come.  But the invitation is there.

One by one, they all arrive at Kat's farm.  Sina, a single mother who is disappointed in her middle-aged son.  Ingrid, solid and dependable but who nurses an inner adventurer who longs to be free.  Lisbeth, who has always relied on her beauty and good marriage.  And Maya who is facing the beginnings of Alzheimer's.

Now in their mid-sixties, all five women find themselves changed over time yet some of what they were in high school remains.  As they get to know one another again, they also adjust to island life.  And come to love it and the people who live there.  And then one day, Ingrid asks why they can't make chocolate from the cocoa beans - and sell little "pieces of happiness" that are also good for you.

Gradually what made these women who they are is revealed.  And as it was, I found myself caring for each of them and hoping they would be able to break free and live new lives.

What a delight to read a book about older women with problems I could relate to!

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The Salt House by Lisa Duffy FIC Duf

A family can have a perfect life - just the usual financial challenges and some stress from renovating the dream house they hope to move into soon.  It takes one event to make that all crumble.  When the novel opens Hope and Jack Kelly have a marriage that is coming apart.  Their daughters, Jess and Kat, have lost the happy family and are having their own private pain.  All of this misery began one year before when the family was thrown into a grief so dark than no one can get out of it.  Hope had put her youngest daughter, Maddie, into her crib for a nap while she tried to get her column written.  Not wanting Maddie to nap too long Hope went to wake her up - but she didn't.  They found a small necklace in her throat.

Hope keeps the ashes in her closet because she can't deal with her grief.  Jack is working himself to death at his fishing business because he can't deal with his grief.  When it seems that things can't get any worse Jack's fishing territory is being threatened by a guy named Ryland who had moved back to town and seems intent on carrying on a feud that started years ago.

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