This Much is True, by Tina Chaulk

this much is true is the second of two novels by local authors that I brought along on my trip with me, and I finished it on the plane on the way to England — so the first thing I can say is that it’s a quick read! (Of course, it’s also a long flight!)Tina [...]

The Sweet Edge, by Alison Pick

Among my bundle of books to take to England (which turned out to be woefully inadequate as I’m such a fast reader) I included two recent novels by Newfoundland authors, one of which was Alison Pick’s The Sweet Edge. This is a short and spare novel about a twentysomething couple, Ellen and Adam, whose relationship [...]

Labyrinth, by Kate Mosse

Labyrinth has all the obvious ingredients for a Book Trudy Should Love. It’s an adventure-in-research, with a volunteer on an archeological dig making a discovery that suddenly has a lot of sinister people interested in either recovering, or covering up, a centuries-old secret. Strong female characters — 13th-century Alais and the modern-day Alice who [...]

Rashi’s Daughters: Joheved, by Maggie Anton

Like far too many Christians, I would have to confess that my knowledge of Judaism pretty much left off where the Bible ended and picked up with the Holocaust, with no real sense (despite my history degree and broad reading) of what Jews were doing for the 2000 years in between, except wandering around [...]

The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, by Laurie R. King

My husband’s thumbs-up on this book (which he gives with great enthusiasm) is probably more significant than mine, since Jason is the Sherlock Holmes fan in the family. The Beekeeper’s Apprentice is the first in King’s series of novels re-imagining the famous detective in retirement with an unlikely apprentice: an exceptionally brilliant young woman named [...]

Masque of the Black Tulip, by Lauren Willig

Having just talked about how much I like those “Adventures in Research” novels (below) I figured I’d definitely like Lauren Willig’s novel about a history grad student chasing down information about French and English spies in the era of the Napoleonic Wars. The story alternates between the grad student and the historical characters she’s [...]

Lord Byron’s Novel: The Evening Land, by John Crowley

There’s a subgenre of fiction that could best be described as “adventures in research,” which almost always hooks me at first glance. Basic plot of an Adventure in Research — a scholar, or a pair or small group of scholars, discovers an ancient and forgotten manuscript, or clues that point to the possibility of [...]