A Night to Remember by Walter Lord

  A Night to Remember by Walter Lord. St. Martin's Griffin, 2005. Originally published in 1955 by Holt, Rinehart, and Winston and reprinted in 1983. Nonfiction. 

This is the 50th anniversary edition of the classic HMS Titanic book. Walter Lord interviewed as many  survivors as he could, studied maps, pored over diagrams, and wove the facts into this highly readable book.  The new introduction by Nathaniel Philbrick, a sea worthy author himself, puts the book into a historical perspective and adds much to understanding of the ship's significance for modern readers.  Before the wreck was discovered by Robert Ballard in 1985, and before the fictionalized movie in 1997, there was the great ship. Thought to be unsinkable, she was the pride of Belfast ship builders. Passengers on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England to New York City in April, 1912  included the most wealthy and well known celebrities of the times as well as other second and third class passengers. Of course, we know now, that an iceberg was waiting and many, many lives were lost. The Carpathia ended up rescuing some passengers. Halifax seamen ended up recovering bodies. With all of the survivors now dead, never again will there be an opportunity to talk with survivors. Walter Lord's crisp, factual, carefully crafted account of the sailing and its aftermath has lost none of its original power. Definitely, this nonfiction book is better than any movie could ever be. Just read it.

Watching You: A Novel by Lisa Jewell

Watching You: A Novel by Lisa Jewell. Atria Books, 2019. Adult Fiction.
In the lovely little Melville Heights neighborhood of Bristol, England, Joey(Joesephine)Mullen is married to Alfie Butter who is working as a house painter. They are reduced living with Jack, her doctor brother, and his pregnant wife, Rebecca. Life is not as great as she hoped it might be, with Joey working at the Whackadoo child care center and pining for romance and self worth. Handsome headmaster Tom Fitzwilliam and his wife, Nicola, live so near that they can see into each other's windows sometimes. The Fitzwilliams have a teenage son who uses his own window to spy on the neighborhood. Jenna Tripp is a student and is valiantly trying to keep everyone from knowing how her own mother is slipping into mental illness. Then, someone is killed. The narrative chapters are alternated with transcripts from the police interviews.  The past of these characters become clearer and their current interweavings are explored until the rather sad, but resolved, ending.  Definitely a thriller and just ripe for a movie version, the novel may make readers wonder just who could be watching them!

Good Girls Lie by J.T. Ellison

Good Girls Lie by J. T. Ellison. Mira, 2019. Adult fiction.

When British teen Ash Carlisle arrives as a student at the exclusive girls' prep school, the Goode School, in Marchburg, Virginia, she is an unknown quantity. Her brother and parents have died. Headmistress Dr. Ford Westhaven, has inherited her position from her own mother whose poor decisions led to dismissal and she is determined not to go down that same path. Ash has secrets though as does Westhaven. Typical girl drama soon becomes deadly. Dare we say that the Ivy has become poisonous?

Ellison, the author of many other thrillers, writes smoothly. She obviously has had experience with the area and with prep school life and teenage girls. The red herrings are there, but she manages to slip in some zingers that will keep readers guessing until the absolute end.

House of Gold: A Novel by Natasha Solomons

House of Gold: A Novel by Natasha Solomons. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2018. Adult fiction.

The wealthy Goldbaum family has mansions, business interests, and family members all around the world. When Greta moves to England to marry Albert, a distant cousin, she leaves the Vienna of 1911 and a life of making any of her own choices. The Goldbaum men are bankers; their wives are expected to have children, run households, and support their husbands. Only when Greta makes an ally in her mother-in-law and finds that she has a passion for gardening, does her life finally begin to feel like her own. Of course, readers know that WWI is coming. Being wealthy and being Jewish will not protect their              families or their wealth.  This is another sweeping, multigenerational novel                                           from the talented author.

Elevator Pitch by Linwood Barclay

Elevator Pitch by Linwood Barclay. 

William Morrow, an imprint of                      HarperCollins, 2019. Adult fiction suspense, thriller.

Can you imagine what would happen if all the elevators in all the buildings in New York City had to be shut down? For Barbara, a journalist, following the mayor's office is just part of her job. For Delgado and Bourque, police partners who investigate cases together, time is of the essence. When several seeming accidents (or is it terrorism?) involve the vertical city's elevators, everyone is part of it all. Mayor Headley and his son, Glover; Barbara's estranged daughter, Arla; a Russian scientist, a political espionage group called the Flyovers, and more intriguing people become part of this mystery and race to find out what is really going on. Every chapter seems to pull readers forward and you may not want to stop reading! PS It is not the kind of scary that will make you afraid to ride on an elevator!

House of Brides: A Novel by Jane Cockram

House of Brides: A Novel by Jane Cockram. HarperCollins, 2019. Adult fiction.

Australian Instagram personality Miranda Courtenay has made mistakes and claims that cause a huge fall from grace. While her father, stepmother, and two younger, half sisters support her, she is embarrassed and guilty, too. When she gets a letter from a cousin in England, she jumps at the chance to visit Barnsley House where her dead mother's family still lives. When she arrives, they think she is the nanny and Miranda decides to play along with the deception.

Before moving away forever, Miranda's mother had written a book about the house and the generations of strong women who lived there. (Hence the title of this book.)  Max, her mother's brother, his wife, Daphne, and Elizabeth, her mother's sister, still live there and all have secrets, too. Mysterious Mrs. Mins has a long history with the family. Who to trust there???  And, the three young children of Max and Daphne are charming. So it goes until Daphne disappears.

A little gothic mystery, a little contemporary search for self, the book is the debut novel by the author. Watch for more by Jane Cockram as this first effort reads smoothly. Typeface switches to a handwritten font when showing the pages from a found notebook. She does a good job of keeping track of time passing with summer festival time, Christmas, and finally Easter. Miranda is a likeable, if questioning, young woman who sneaks around looking for information, finding secret books, trying to hide from her own father, and putting together the pieces of the past which all too much influence the present.

The Trial of Lizzie Borden, A True Story by Cara Robertson

The Trial of Lizzie Borden, A True Story by Cara Robertson. Simon and Schuster, 2019. Adult nonfiction.

On August 4, 1892, in Fall River, Massachusetts, the mutilated bodies of Andrew Borden and his second wife were found in their home on Second Street. The ensuing investigation pointed to his younger daughter, Lizzie. The sensational trial and her subsequent verdict of innocence made world wide news and has fascinated people ever since.

Cara Robertson started her research on the case as an undergraduate at Harvard and has continued since that time. She earned a JD degree and has had an illustrious career. This, her first book, is well researched and well written. A hefty list of sources are detailed in the back of the book.

Did Lizzie do it?  Robertson clearly tells about the setting, the people involved, and the aftermath. But, readers will have to make up their own minds about the verdict. We do know, that, changing her name to Lizbeth and moving up to the more elite part of town, Lizzie lived out her life in Fall River. Although some friends stood by her during the trial, she was "not welcome" in the Congregational Church where she had been so active in her youth. Naming her new home "Maplecroft" and etching the name into the concrete was considered to be showing off. Her sister, Emma, moved out in 1905, and apparently the two never spoke again. Lizzie died in 1927.

Robertson delves into the history of Fall River and the Borden family. She finds that Lizzie's lawyer died unexpectedly and his office still has the papers relating to the trial locked up, claiming lawyer/client privilege never ends. The prosecuting attorney's papers are mainly available at the Fall River Historical Society. Somehow, I suspect, if those first documents and notes are ever made public, Cara Robertson will be the first in line to examine them all.