{"id":6964,"date":"2017-12-14T06:48:02","date_gmt":"2017-12-14T11:48:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6964"},"modified":"2017-12-14T06:48:02","modified_gmt":"2017-12-14T11:48:02","slug":"30-second-book-reviews-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6964","title":{"rendered":"30-Second Book Reviews – Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Reading\"

photo: Carlos Martinez, creative commons license<\/p><\/div>\n

Recently Published<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

All the Wicked Girls<\/em><\/a> by Chris Whitaker \u2013 An thriller in which real and symbolic dark clouds hover menacingly over a tiny Alabama community. Young girls\u2014young religious girls\u2014are being murdered. When another goes missing, the town\u2019s turned into a tinderbox, and the sheriff is hard put to control the situation. The sheriff, the girl\u2019s twin sister, and a couple of outsider friends are captivating characters. Written from multiple points of view, this is a complex, compelling story.<\/p>\n

A Cold Death<\/em><\/a> by Marilyn Meredith \u2013 Another in the popular Deputy Tempe Crabtree series. A group of sniping acquaintances is snowbound at a mountain cabin and none too happy about it. Loyalties shift; suspicions rise; accusations cascade. Crabtree also must deal with the ghost of a former resident, and the light touch of paranormal is handled well.<\/p>\n

Classics Revisited<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Theft: A Love Story<\/em><\/a> by Man Booker prize-winner Peter Carey \u2013 In this 2006 novel, a flamboyant Australian artist struggles with a career past its peak, while dealing with his developmentally disabled (but entertainingly astute) younger brother, a conniving girlfriend who is always one step ahead of him, and an unforgiving ex-wife. \u201cWitty, urbane, funny, and profound.\u201d<\/p>\n

Our Game<\/em><\/a> by John le Carr\u00e9 \u2013 When one of the oldest friends of retired MI6 agent Tim Cranmer goes missing, along with Cranmer\u2019s mistress, he sets out to find them. In this 1995 spy thriller, Cranmer\u2019s bosses try to convince him his Cold War and thus his career are over, but his friend and fellow-spy appears to have identified some new mission, using the \u00a337 million he\u2019s stolen from the Russians to finance it. With this fast-paced, enjoyable read, you\u2019re in the hands of the master.<\/p>\n

The Directive<\/em><\/a> by Matthew Quirk \u2013 There\u2019s a short window of time between when the U.S. Federal Reserve makes its recommendations and when they\u2019re made public. During that hour or so, they are one of the most closely guarded secrets in the financial world. The Ford brothers want that information, which is worth, well, millions. Clever plotting, persuasive, a fun read from 2014.<\/p>\n

Audiobooks<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

A Gentleman in Moscow<\/em><\/a> by Amor Towles \u2013 Prepare yourself to fall in love with Count Alexander Rostov, confined after the Revolution to Moscow\u2019s famed hotel, The Metropol. The rich life he builds there never strays from elegance and civility, traits that the new Soviet power-brokers lack utterly. It\u2019s a lovely story, and, as Ann Patchett says, \u201cThe book is like a salve.\u201d Great narrator too.<\/p>\n

The Lady from Zagreb<\/em><\/a> by Philip Kerr \u2013 Kerr\u2019s tenth Bernie Gunther novel, this one has the Berlin police detective on a confidential assignment from Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels\u2014to track down the father of his favorite actress. Gunther meets the woman, and they begin a risky love affair. He does find her father, knee-deep in a bloodbath in Yugoslavia, but he and Goebbels decide to keep his murderous career a secret and tell her he\u2019s dead. Like all secrets, this one has consequences. Gunther\u2019s sly critiques and disdain for the Nazis is another dangerous activity, and you worry he\u2019ll go too far.<\/p>\n

A few more thirty-second book reviews are here<\/a>. Enjoy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently Published All the Wicked Girls by Chris Whitaker \u2013 An thriller in which real and symbolic dark clouds hover menacingly over a tiny Alabama community. Young girls\u2014young religious girls\u2014are being murdered. When another goes missing, the town\u2019s turned into … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"30-Second Book Reviews - Part 2 Last minute gift ideas for people on your holiday list--or yourself!","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[77,122,54,193,126,60,32],"tags":[1194,1197,557,1196,965,1193,1195,129],"class_list":["post-6964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audio-books","category-book","category-detective","category-espionage","category-reading-2","category-storytelling","category-thriller","tag-amor-towles","tag-chris-whitaker","tag-john-le-carre","tag-marilyn-meredith","tag-matthew-quirk","tag-peter-carey","tag-philip-kerr","tag-wars-and-conflicts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1Ok","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6964"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6964\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6966,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6964\/revisions\/6966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}