What I've Been Reading

What a great reading year I am having and Libby is a major reason why.  Here are two more books that kept me enthralled and it's going to be hard this year to compile my top ten list.  So many wonderful books to choose from:

"Clare Cassidy is no stranger to murder. A high school English teacher specializing in the Gothic writer R. M. Holland, she teaches a course on it every year. But when one of Clare’s colleagues and closest friends is found dead, with a line from R. M. Holland’s most famous story, “The Stranger,” left by her body, Clare is horrified to see her life collide with the storylines of her favourite literature. To make matters worse, the police suspect the killer is someone Clare knows. Unsure whom to trust, she turns to her closest confidant, her diary, the only outlet she has for her darkest suspicions and fears about the case. - Goodreads. 

The Stranger Diaries by Elly Griffiths (2018) won the 2020 Edgar Award for Best Mystery Novel.  And an academic setting can be a great place for a mystery.  It's a tight knit community.  The teachers all know each other and there can be conflicts.  The Stranger Diaries is my first time reading Elly Griffiths and this novel held my interest all the way through.  

I would also describe The Stranger Diaries as a fair play mystery where the author leaves subtle clues throughout the book so that the reader has a chance to figure out who the murderer is before the novel comes to a close.  Agatha Christie is the gold standard for fair play mysteries and as with Anthony Horowitz, Elly Griffiths is a writer who is expertly following in that fine Christie tradition.

"The newly constituted United States actually emerged as a fragile, internally divided union of states contending still with European empires and other independent republics on the North American continent. Native peoples sought to defend their homelands from the flood of American settlers ... The system of American slavery grew increasingly powerful and expansive ... Bitter party divisions pitted elites favoring strong government against those, like Andrew Jackson, espousing a democratic populism for white men ... Taylor’s elegant history of this tumultuous period offers indelible miniatures of key characters from Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth to Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Margaret Fuller. It captures the high-stakes political drama as Jackson and Adams, Clay, Calhoun, and Webster contend over slavery, the economy, Indian removal, and national expansion" - Goodreads

America right now is a very divided country and to try and make sense of it all I have started an American History reading project.  My first book was American Revolution by Gordon S Wood which covered 1763 to 1789.  And for my next book I decided on American Republics: A Continental History of The United States (1783-1850) by the award winning historian Alan Taylor.  American Republics is a gripping, well written history book that will engage the reader.

And one theme that Alan Taylor brings home in American Republics is that America was a fragile union way before the Civil War era.  We were divided not only by north and south but by east and west.  We were also divided politically between those who wanted a strong central government and those that wanted more power to the states.

Alan Taylor details the violent early beginnings of the United States: slavery, Native American removal and the philosophy of Manifest Destiny.  It's not a pretty picture and Taylor tells it honestly.  But if we are to learn from history we cannot ignore the past.  On the plus side there are always people in every age who speak out and try to right the wrongs at often tremendous cost to themselves. American Republics tells theIr stories as well.  

Two very different books both I highly recommend