Book Recommendation – The 22 Murders of Maddie May

It isn’t always the case, but many times the title of a book is enough to peak my curiosity. Many times, I am pleasantly surprised and the book was worth the read. That was the case with the latest read.

This is the first book I have read from Max Berry. The 22 Murders of Madison May had me wondering. Is Madison the one who kills 22 times? Nope. It is Madison that is murdered 22 times. How can that happen? Let’s look at the Goodreads Synopsis:

From the critically acclaimed author of Jennifer Government and Lexicon comes mind-bending speculative psychological suspense about a serial killer pursuing his victim across time and space, and the woman who is determined to stop him, even if it upends her own reality.

I love you. In every world.

Young real estate agent Madison May is shocked when a client at an open house says these words to her. The man, a stranger, seems to know far too much about her, and professes his love–shortly before he murders her.

Felicity Staples hates reporting on murders. As a journalist for a midsize New York City paper, she knows she must take on the assignment to research Madison May’s shocking murder, but the crime seems random and the suspect is in the wind. That is, until Felicity spots the killer on the subway, right before he vanishes.

Soon, Felicity senses her entire universe has shifted. No one remembers Madison May, or Felicity’s encounter with the mysterious man. And her cat is missing. Felicity realizes that in her pursuit of Madison’s killer, she followed him into a different dimension–one where everything about her existence is slightly altered. At first, she is determined to return to the reality she knows, but when Madison May–in this world, a struggling actress–is murdered again, Felicity decides she must find the killer–and learns that she is not the only one hunting him.

Traveling through different realities, Felicity uncovers the opportunity–and danger–of living more than one life.

You may be saying to yourself, “Oh great. Here is another time travel book Keith read.” However, it really isn’t time travel. The synopsis references other dimensions. In a sense each dimension is an alternate reality of the previous one. In the various dimensions, Madison’s jobs seem to change. Strangely, it seems that Felicity’s does not. That was my only real hang up in the story.

It is an exciting race against time, in almost each dimension to prevent the murder of Madison. It’s also sort of a cat and mouse game. It is a constant pursuit of a killer who is always after the same target. How can they stop these murders? Can Felicity get back to the dimension she started from? Will she forever be jumping from one dimension to the other?

I didn’t have any high expectations because I picked the book without reading the synopsis. I picked it on the title alone and enjoyed a great read because of that.

4 out of 5 stars.

Book Recommendation – Small Things Like These

This book kept coming up in blogs I read and as a recommendation on Goodreads. I was in between books and saw that this was a relatively short audiobook, so I read it. Small Things Like These is book that makes you think.

It felt more like a short story or novella to me, and when it ended, I wanted to know more. The Goodreads Synopsis is short (so is the book, so I guess it makes sense). Here it is:

It is 1985 in a small Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man faces into his busiest season. Early one morning, while delivering an order to the local convent, Bill makes a discovery which forces him to confront both his past and the complicit silences of a town controlled by the church.

Already an international bestseller, Small Things Like These is a deeply affecting story of hope, quiet heroism, and empathy from one of our most critically lauded and iconic writers.

I felt that there was a great message in the story, but it probably could have been delivered in a shorter story. Don’t let that steer you away from it, because the “extra” stuff gives you a broader sense of the characters and makes the story’s message hit a bit harder.

The book ends quickly. I almost felt like maybe the audio book wasn’t completely done. I felt like further chapters were missing. That isn’t the case and the ending leaves you wondering what happened afterward. It’s a bit open ended in a way that you can sort or imagine what happened next.

While searching for information on the book, I found out that it has already been made into a film last year. The movie seems to follow the book, however, it ends a little different than the book. Hollywood tends to take creative license with books turned into movies.

At any rate, if you are looking for a quick read, this may be for you. The audiobook was about 2 hours.

3.5 out of 5 stars.

Book Recommendation – The Ministry of Time

I waited a long time for The Ministry of Time to come out as an audiobook. On a recent trip to Barnes and Nobel, I found it and bought it. Shortly after I bought it and began to read it, the audiobook was released.

I read the first 3/4 of it, and listened to the end of it. Before I go further, here is the Goodreads Synopsis:

A time travel romance, a spy thriller, a workplace comedy, and an ingenious exploration of the nature of power and the potential for love to change it all: Welcome to The Ministry of Time, the exhilarating debut novel by Kaliane Bradley.

In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on. A recently established government ministry is gathering “expats” from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible—for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.

She is tasked with working as a “bridge”: living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as “1847” or Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as “washing machines,” “Spotify,” and “the collapse of the British Empire.” But with an appetite for discovery, a seven-a-day cigarette habit, and the support of a charming and chaotic cast of fellow expats, he soon adjusts.

Over the next year, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a horrifically uncomfortable roommate dynamic, evolves into something much deeper. By the time the true shape of the Ministry’s project comes to light, the bridge has fallen haphazardly, fervently in love, with consequences she never could have imagined. Forced to confront the choices that brought them together, the bridge must finally reckon with how—and whether she believes—what she does next can change the future.

An exquisitely original and feverishly fun fusion of genres and ideas, The Ministry of Time asks: What does it mean to defy history, when history is living in your house? Kaliane Bradley’s answer is a blazing, unforgettable testament to what we owe each other in a changing world.

This was unlike any other time travel book I have read in that the time travel has already happened when you begin the book. The main character is one of the chosen agents to watch these “expats.” They are people from the past who have been brought to present. They must learn how to live in this new environment.

The story was actually pretty good. There was a section of the story that went into a bit too much detail about a sexual encounter. I could have done with out that, and I’m not sure it was important to the story.

The way it is described above is fairly accurate. It is like a spy thriller that has some romance to it. There were twists that I didn’t see coming and the story wraps up in a way that there could be a sequel if the author is inclined to write one.

3.5 Stars out of 5

Book Recommendations – Before the Coffee Gets Cold

I was in between books, knowing that one I had on hold would arrive in a day or two. I normally would wait to start a book in that situation, but the title of this one caught my eye. When I read the synopsis and saw it involved time travel, I picked it up. The book is “Before the Coffee Gets Cold.”

This was no ordinary time travel book. This was time travel with a set of rigid rules. In most stories, a character goes back (or forward) in time and stays awhile. There is usually some thing they are trying to change (like in 11.22.63) or someone they want to see (like in Bid Time Return – aka Somewhere in Time). In this book, the travelers are well aware that whether in the past or future, they can’t change the present. That is just one of the rules.

Before I go further, take a look at the Goodreads synopsis:

What would you change if you could go back in time?

In a small back alley in Tokyo, there is a café which has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. But this coffee shop offers its customers a unique experience: the chance to travel back in time.

In Before the Coffee Gets Cold, we meet four visitors, each of whom is hoping to make use of the café’s time-travelling offer, in order to: confront the man who left them, receive a letter from their husband whose memory has been taken by early onset Alzheimer’s, to see their sister one last time, and to meet the daughter they never got the chance to know.

But the journey into the past does not come without risks: customers must sit in a particular seat, they cannot leave the café, and finally, they must return to the present before the coffee gets cold . .

Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s beautiful, moving story explores the age-old question: what would you change if you could travel back in time? More importantly, who would you want to meet, maybe for one last time?

As a coffee drinker, my first thought was, “Just how long does it take the coffee to get cold?” I tried with a cup this morning and it was about 20 minutes. I Googled it and the response was:

“A freshly brewed cup of coffee will take roughly 30-60 minutes to cool to room temperature. This time can vary based on the coffee’s initial temperature, the size of the cup, and the room temperature.“

I think it is difficult to do anything when you are under a time constraint. If I had to go back and time for whatever reason, 20-60 minutes would be gone in a blink of an eye. Would it even be worth it? I’m not sure, I guess it would depend on what I was going back for or who I wanted to see. This is difficult with the set of rules, however.

You wouldn’t be able to go to and watch the Gettysburg address or any other historical event because you can’t leave the cafe. If I wanted to go back to see my mom, the only way that could happen is if she’d ever been to the cafe. Even if things fell into place for you to go back, there is still the time factor. I’m not sure I could focus on anything except that time was ticking away.

With all that being said, it seems like I am really dissing this book. I’m really not, because really, the people who do time travel in the book all get something out of their visit. Maybe it is closure, a last wish, a resolution, or just an answer to a question. They all get something out of it, and it is not a bad book.

The book is apparently the first in a series of five. Will I read the others? Perhaps.

3 stars out of 5 (because I didn’t care for the rules!)

Book Recommendation – Famous Last Words

A couple years ago, I stumbled on a really good mystery/time travel story – Wrong Place, Wrong Time. It was written by an unfamiliar artist to me named Gillian McAllister. I wrote about the book here.

I was excited to hear that a new book from her would hit the shelves in 2025. As soon as I saw it hit my library app, I put it on hold. I was the 18th person waiting for it, so it was going to be a few weeks before I got my hands on it. Last week, it arrived – Famous Last Words.

If I had to classify the book, I might call it a mystery, but it really is more of a suspenseful story. I’m not sure I’d call it a thriller, either (they do), but it kept my attention all the way through. Here is the Goodreads synopsis:

From the author of Reese’s Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller Wrong Place Wrong Time comes an addictive thriller about a new mother’s world upended when her husband commits a terrifying crime. How well does she truly know the man she loves? And what danger does she face if her entire life has been built on a lie?

It is June 21st, the longest day of the year, and new mother Camilla’s life is about to change forever. After months of maternity leave, she will drop her infant daughter off at daycare for the first time and return to her job as a literary agent. Finally. But, when she wakes, her husband Luke isn’t there, and in his place is a cryptic note.

Then it starts. Breaking news: there’s a hostage situation developing in London. The police arrive, and tell her Luke is involved. But he isn’t a hostage. Her husband—doting father, eternal optimist—is the gunman.

What she does next is crucial. Because only she knows what the note he left behind that morning says…

Famous Last Words is the story of a crime, a marriage, and more secrets than Camilla ever could have imagined. This novel cements Gillian McAllister’s reputation as “the best at putting her characters in impossible situations and making her readers not only contemplate but feel what it would be like to find themselves in those situations.”

The story really takes off right from the get go. It is written in 3 parts. It starts with the hostage situation, then you pick up 7 years later, and finally 7 years after another key event. So the story spans about 15 years or so.

As I have always promised, no spoilers. I will say that it took me a minute or two to see how everything pieced together, and that there was a twist that I should have seen coming and didn’t.

I don’t think this was as good as Wrong Place, Wrong Time, but it is close. I will give it 4 stars out of 5.

Book Recommendation – The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife

“You’ll never regret being kind even when people aren’t kind to you.”

The truth quoted above is just one of many I found inside my latest read. I added it to my “Want to read” list after seeing the title. “Borrowed life” intrigued me. Author Anna Johnston was new to me as well. I wasn’t sure what to expect.

The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife began to show up in blogs I follow, on a list of books whose titles all follow the “The _________ _______ of Character Name” format, and then as a Goodreads suggestion. The suggestion read: “For readers of Remarkably Bright Creatures and A Man Called Ove,” both of which I really enjoyed.

The book had me laughing and crying at times. There are so many things in the book that I could relate to. Despite the main character, Frederick, doing some pretty unbelievably insane things, he is very likable. You understand why he is doing what he is doing, and pull for him. I’m jumping ahead here. Before I go further, let me give you the Goodreads synopsis:

For readers of Remarkably Bright Creatures and A Man Called Ove, a warm, life-affirming debut about a zany case of mistaken identity that allows a lonely old man one last chance to be part of a family.

‘Would you mind terribly, old boy, if I borrowed the rest of your life? I promise I’ll take excellent care of it.’

Frederick Fife was born with an extra helping of kindness in his heart. If he borrowed your car, he’d return it washed with a full tank of gas. The problem is there’s nobody left in Fred’s life to borrow from. At eighty-two, he’s desperately lonely, broke, and on the brink of homelessness. But Fred’s luck changes when, in a bizarre case of mistaken identity, he takes the place of grumpy Bernard Greer at the local nursing home. Now he has warm meals in his belly and a roof over his head—as long as his poker face is in better shape than his prostate and that his look-alike never turns up.

Denise Simms is stuck breathing the same disappointing air again and again. A middle-aged mom and caregiver at Bernard’s facility, her crumbling marriage and daughter’s health concerns are suffocating her joy for life. Wounded by her two-faced husband, she vows never to let a man deceive her again.

As Fred walks in Bernard’s shoes, he leaves a trail of kindness behind him, fueling Denise’s suspicions about his true identity. When unexpected truths are revealed, Fred and Denise rediscover their sense of purpose and learn how to return a broken life to mint condition.

Bittersweet and remarkably perceptive, The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife is a hilarious, feel-good, clever novel about grief, forgiveness, redemption, and finding family.

Through a series of mishaps and misunderstandings, lonely Frederick suddenly finds himself amongst some very unique people at the nursing home. He is quick to be nice to everyone he meets there. He befriends patients and staff, many of whom cannot believe the change in personality of “Bernard.”

Many of the situations he finds himself in will have you laughing out loud. The kindness and compassion Fred extends to everyone will warm your heart. The struggle and guilt Frederick feels inside with each day at the nursing home will break your heart. Then there are situations that make you wonder just how he’s going to get out of the mess he’s created.

I don’t want to give too much away, so I will just say that this book is simply wonderful! It is definitely one of the best books I have read this year. I was surprised that this is Anna Johnston’s debut novel. She did such an amazing job of expressing the various feelings that characters were experiencing. I felt the anger, the grief, the disbelief, and the happiness right along with them. That doesn’t happen very often for me.

This incredible story is one that I will remember for a very long time.

5 out of 5 stars.

Book Recommendation – I Hope This Finds You Well

When I read the premise of this book, it peaked my interest. Can you imagine if you were able to read your co-workers messages to each other? Would you want to know what they think about you? What could you do with the information? I was anxious to find out.

Natalie Sue’s “I Hope This Finds You Well” is a book that had very high praise from bloggers, book sites, and even my local Barnes and Noble. Once I was able to find the audio version, I scooped it up. It didn’t disappoint. Let’s go a little deeper with the Goodreads synopsis:

As far as Jolene is concerned, her interactions with her colleagues should start and end with her official duties as an admin for Supershops, Inc. Unfortunately, her irritating, incompetent coworkers don’t seem to understand the importance of boundaries. Her secret to survival? She vents her grievances in petty email postscripts, then changes the text color to white so no one can see. That is, until one of her secret messages is exposed. Her punishment: sensitivity training (led by the suspiciously friendly HR guy, Cliff) and rigorous email restrictions.

When an IT mix-up grants her access to her entire department’s private emails and DMs, Jolene knows she should report it, but who could resist reading what their coworkers are really saying? And when she discovers layoffs are coming, she realizes this might just be the key to saving her job. The plan is simple: gain her boss’s favor, convince HR she’s Supershops material and beat out the competition.

But as Jolene is drawn further into her coworker’s private worlds and secrets, her carefully constructed walls begin to crumble—especially around Cliff, who she definitely cannot have feelings for. Soon she will need to decide if she’s ready to leave the comfort of her cubicle, even if it means coming clean to her colleagues.

Crackling with laugh-out-loud dialogue and relatable observations, I Hope This Finds You Well is a fresh and surprisingly tender comedy about loneliness and love beyond our computer screens. This sparkling debut novel will open your heart to the everyday eccentricities of work culture and the undeniable human connection that comes with it.

I went into this book with an idea of what to expect, however, there was much more to this story. I really found myself connecting with the characters. Each one seemed to be relatable to someone I had worked with in the past or currently. “We’ve all worked with someone like (Fill in the blank)” they say….

Have you ever told a lie and then have to cover it up with another lie and another lie until you are at your wits end? As the storyline progresses, it is sort of like that. The situations that Jolene finds herself in build up into the chaos you might see in an old sitcom. By the end, you can’t help but wonder if things are all going to work out in the end.

Not really knowing what to expect, I can say that it exceeded my expectations. It was a good and relatable story with likable and unlikable characters. It keep moving in such a way that you want to know what will come of the situation presented. “How is she going to get out of that?” I found myself saying.

If you’ve ever worked for an annoying boss or co-worker you will relate and enjoy this story. If you work in an office setting, you will enjoy it and relate to it a bit more.

4.5 out of 5 stars

Book Recommendation – The Demon of Unrest

This book has been on my “To read” list for a bit. A co-worker read it before me and said how much she loved it. So as soon as I had finished the book I was reading, I got ahold of this one – The Demon of Unrest.

As someone who loves history, I truly found this book fascinating. It takes place during the time leading up to the Civil War. Here is the Goodreads synopsis:

On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the fluky victor in a tight race for president. The country was bitterly at odds; Southern extremists were moving ever closer to destroying the Union, with one state after another seceding and Lincoln powerless to stop them. Slavery fueled the conflict, but somehow the passions of North and South came to focus on a lonely federal fortress in Charleston: Fort Sumter.

Master storyteller Erik Larson offers a gripping account of the chaotic months between Lincoln’s election and the Confederacy’s shelling of Sumter—a period marked by tragic errors and miscommunications, enflamed egos and craven ambitions, personal tragedies and betrayals. Lincoln himself wrote that the trials of these five months were “so great that, could I have anticipated them, I would not have believed it possible to survive them.”

At the heart of this suspense-filled narrative are Major Robert Anderson, Sumter’s commander and a former slave owner sympathetic to the South but loyal to the Union; Edmund Ruffin, a vain and bloodthirsty radical who stirs secessionist ardor at every opportunity; and Mary Boykin Chesnut, wife of a prominent planter, conflicted over both marriage and slavery and seeing parallels between both. In the middle of it all is the overwhelmed Lincoln, battling with his duplicitous Secretary of State, William Seward, as he tries desperately to avert a war that he fears is inevitable—one that will eventually kill 750,000 Americans.

Drawing on diaries, secret communiques, slave ledgers, and plantation records, Larson gives us a political horror story that captures the forces that led America to the brink—a dark reminder that we often don’t see a cataclysm coming until it’s too late.

I had learned about Fort Sumter in school history classes, but this book went so much deeper. There were things I had never heard before. The events that led up to the Civil War were much more complicated that I was aware of.

Mary Chesnut compiled a diary full of information and insight. That diary would be published in a few forms. “Mary Chesnut’s Civil War,” “Mary Chesnut’s Diary,” and “A Diary From Dixie,” just to name a few. Many entries from the diary are quoted in this book giving you a first hand account of some key events.

Throughout the book, you are treated to things Lincoln wrote, military communications, and diaries from other key people. These things go deep into the personal conflicts each of these people were dealing with.

The book is a long one, but I rarely felt that it was dragging. If you are a history buff, I cannot recommend this book more highly.

5 out of 5 stars!

Book Recommendation – The JFK Conspiracy

I love history. I love reading historical fiction and historical non-fiction. In 2019, Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch began their “Conspiracy” series. It started with The First Conspiracy about the filed plot to kill George Washington. Then there was The Lincoln Conspiracy which was about a failed plot to kill Lincoln. This was followed by The Nazi Conspiracy which told of the failed plot to kill Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin.

This time around it is the JFK Conspiracy which is about a plot to kill Kennedy before he even entered the office as President.

I had never heard this story before, but it was very good. Here is the Goodreads synopsis:

From the New York Times bestselling authors of The Nazi Conspiracy and The Lincoln Conspiracy comes a true, little-known story about the first assassination attempt on John F. Kennedy, right before his inauguration.

Kennedy, the thirty-fifth president of the United States, is often ranked among Americans’ most well-liked presidents. Yet what most Americans don’t know is that JFK’s historic presidency almost ended before it began—at the hands of a disgruntled sociopathic loner armed with dynamite.

On December 11, 1960, shortly after Kennedy’s election and before his inauguration, a retired postal worker named Richard Pavlick waited in his car—a parked Buick—on a quiet street in Palm Beach, Florida. Pavlick knew the president-elect’s schedule. He knew when Kennedy would leave his house. He knew where Kennedy was going. From there, Pavlick had a simple plan—one that could’ve changed the course of history.

Written in the gripping, page-turning style that is the hallmark of Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch’s bestselling series, this is a slice of history vividly brought to life. Meltzer and Mensch are at the top of their game with this brilliant exploration of what could’ve been for one of the most compelling leaders of the 20th century.

Meltzer and Mensch do such a wonderful job presenting this. There are the familiar characters that we all know: Bobby Kennedy, Joseph Kennedy, and Jackie Kennedy. There are names from behind the scenes, like the men of the Secret Service, too. The book does a wonderful job describing to readers the plan to kill Kennedy. It also shows some of the more “touching” moments with Jackie Kennedy and all that she went through.

I suppose any book about JFK would have to talk about the assassination, and they save that for the end of the book. It all ties together really. Clint Hill is the Secret Service man who is assigned to protect Jackie Kennedy. He is also the agent in those chilling pictures from Dealy Plaza who runs to the President’s car and jumps on the back after the shots are fired.

I have yet to be disappointed by this series. I hope that they continue to find stories like this one to enlighten readers.

4.5 out of 5 stars.

Book Recommendation – The Naked Truth

If you are looking for something to make you chuckle, laugh or guffaw, may I suggest a book I just finished? The Naked Truth by Leslie Nielsen.

If you have been a reader of this blog for awhile, you are aware of my silly sense of humor. Airplane!, Top Secret, and the Naked Gun Trilogy are among my favorite laugh out loud movies. Airplane! was the catalyst that threw Leslie Nielsen into many comedic roles.

If you take a look at the top of the book’s cover, it says that the book tells Leslie’s “Incredible Life Story – Uncensored, Uninhibited, and COMPLETELY MADE UP! The book reads just like Leslie is doing a voiceover in the Naked Gun films. It is one crazy line after another. Nielsen “offers a zany account of his life and career, providing outrageous anecdotes about his four decades in show business, famous people, and more.”

One reviewer states: This is two books in one- a parody and honest retelling of one’s life couched in blatant lies.

Sewn into this fabric of fantasy is about 25% truth-telling. The lies ares so obvious that it is not difficult to detect. Yet, within the blatant hyperbole there is much to learn about the underpinnings of an actor’s mind and motivation.

I guess hindsight gives everyone the right to distort the facts. Who cares- as long as it makes for a good story, and this book does.

I had to get the full book at the library, because the audio book was abridged. I wanted to read the whole thing after hearing the shortened version.

All in all, it was a funny way to relax and waste some time without having to think too much. Who doesn’t need that now and then?

4 out of 5 stars