The Best Books I've Read

The Best Book I Read This Month: The Way of All Flesh by Ambrose Parry

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The best book I read this month was a historical mystery, my favorite genre. The Way of All Flesh by Ambrose Parry is set in Edinburgh in 1847, and it’s as much about the history of medicine as it is about murder. The story centers around the household of Dr. James Simpson, who popularized the use of chloroform as an anaesthetic; the mystery around the deaths of a prostitute and a housemaid. The “detectives” are Simpson’s apprentice, Will Raven, and housemaid, Sarah Fisher.

I loved many things about this book, but the giddiest thrill came from recognizing so many of the street names and locations from my visit to Edinburgh this past fall. Knowing I’d walked along some of the same streets as the characters gave special life to the setting and the story. (And speaks of a city that preserves its past instead of destroying it.)

The writing, too, was pitch perfect—the language reflective of the mid-19th century setting of the story, not just in the dialogue but in the descriptions, as well. The characters—Raven and Sarah, in particular—are complex and not caricatures. If this becomes a series, I look forward to seeing how their partnership develops.

The plotting and mystery were also well done. This was not a typical serial killer mystery, and I liked that the murders were not so straightforward. I also found the killer’s comeuppance especially creative. (The foreshadowing for what happens to the killer is very subtly done, but it works.)

My hope is that this becomes the first in a series, because Parry—in reality, a husband and wife team—has the goods when it comes to writing engaging mysteries and I wouldn’t mind spending more time hanging out in the Simpson household.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Death in Cold Water by Patricia Skalka

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The best book I read this month was a mystery that swept me away: Death in Cold Water by Patricia Skalka. I read it in a single Sunday, abandoning my laundry and food prep plans so I could find out whodunit and why.

The book is, I belatedly discovered, the third in a series. I have since read the first two, and I think this third book is the best of the three. (There is a fourth book, but I haven’t gotten to it yet.)

The entire series is set in Door County, a peninsula near Green Bay, Wisconsin that is a popular summer vacation spot. (I’ve been. It’s charming and beautiful. The town of Sister Bay, in particular, reminds of Laguna Beach, CA, with all its art galleries.) The “detective” in the mystery series is Dave Cubiak, a transplanted Chicago cop now working as the Door County sheriff. Skalka does a nice job of balancing Cubiak’s struggle to start over after losing his wife and child (in events that predate the series) with his efforts to acclimate to his new job and surroundings.

In Death in Cold Water, Cubiak is tasked with solving the disappearance of the peninsula’s wealthiest resident. The victim’s connection to the Green Bay Packers leads to FBI involvement and a focus on terrorism, but Cubiak’s gut tells him something else is going on. The tale twists and turns, laying out details at just the right pace. When Cubiak does solve the mystery, it’s satisfying but by no means a happy ending.

The Best Book I Read This Month: A Brilliant Death by Robin Yocum

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The best book I read this month was so good that I was late to work one day so I could finish it. That book is A Brilliant Death by Robin Yocum.

As you might guess from the title, the book is a mystery. It revolves around a disappearance in 1953 and an apparent suicide in 1971. The story—told by the best friend of the young man who apparently died in 1971—recounts the story of that friendship and the friends’ quest to find out what happened in 1953, when the mother of one of the boys disappeared. The big town rumor is that she died by misadventure, but a few folks in town suspect otherwise—either escape to a better life or murder.

The voice and sense of place in the book is exceptional. It’s set in the real-life small town of Brilliant, Ohio, located across the Ohio River from West Virginia and about an hour’s drive from Pittsburgh, PA, and it’s a town that Yocum clearly knows well. His characters are just as well-drawn, although the main villain does seem a bit over the top at times.

The one part of the book that didn’t work for me was the prologue. I think it was completely unnecessary and a distraction from what the book was really about. I found out later that A Brilliant Death is part of a trilogy—each book centering on one of three cousins. (One of the cousins narrates this book.) The prologue explains the cousins’ family history. If you’re planning to read the whole trilogy (I’m not), the prologue is useful. But if, like me, you’re only reading this one book—skip it.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Never Caught by Erica Armstrong Dunbar

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The best book I read this month was another edition of “our Founding Fathers were jerks”—this time about George Washington. The book, Never Caught, tells the story of Ona Judge, a woman enslaved by the Washingtons who successfully escaped to freedom.

As history books go, this one was relatively short—about 200 pages, not counting the copious notes and acknowledgements at the end. It was an easy read, too, thanks to Dunbar’s plain-spoken style.

What is remarkable about Judge, beyond her escape from the home and control of the president of the United States, is the amount of information available about her—including her own words. We have very little record of any enslaved persons from that time period. But not only have George Washington’s records and letters referring to Judge, we also have two interviews that she gave later in her life. (If you get the paperback version of the book, it includes transcripts of those interviews. They are not included in the hardcover edition.) It was because of these sources that Dunbar was able to craft this narrative. And as many historians do, she filled in the gaps with conclusions and inferences based on available data.

Dunbar does not sugarcoat Judge’s experiences, either, whether those experiences were working for the Washingtons or trying to survive as a fugitive free woman. Sometimes, in an effort to emphasize the risks and dangers Judge faced, Dunbar gets repetitive. But that was a small price to pay for the story of such a strong, determined woman.