Three Great Books #22

Special summer vacation reading edition!

The Soulmate, by Sally Hepworth

Who wants to be stuck on a vacation without a great book or three? Not me, which is why I approach my holiday reading planning with the seriousness of Tom Coughlin preparing for the Super Bowl. The goal: fiction I can’t put down. This year I started with a domestic psychological thriller. This genre often seems to feature intriguing hooks and disappointing resolutions, but The Soulmate was surprising, fun, and satisfying. It’s set in Australia and told through the perspectives of two women, Pippa and Amanda. Pippa is married to Gabe, and they live in their dream house on a seaside cliff with their two daughters, having recently moved following some unspecified difficulties on Gabe’s part. The cliff turns out to be a local suicide spot, and Gabe has successfully talked down seven would-be jumpers. One night, though, Amanda appears on the cliff, and Gabe cannot stop her from plunging to her death. But when questioned by the police, Gabe’s story of what happened doesn’t quite match up with what Pippa thinks she saw. Does Pippa really know her husband? Did Amanda know hers? This is truly addictive beach/pool/porch/couch reading.

Drowning: The Rescue of Flight 1421, by T.J. Newman

T.J. Newman is a former flight attendant who was rejected by 41 agents when she was shopping her first aviation thriller, Falling. (The 42nd agent was a winner and the book got a seven-figure advance.) I really enjoyed Falling, but Drowning is much better. The premise: A flight loses an engine and all hydraulic power soon after takeoff from Honolulu. With no ability to reach an airport, the flight crew is forced to ditch into the ocean. A small group of survivors opt to stay in the plane, hoping for rescue, rather than brave the burning jet fuel outside. Then the plane sinks hundreds of feet into the sea. The group left inside the plane (with limited oxygen) is a motley crew that includes Will Kent, who was escorting his 11-year-old daughter Shannon to camp; First Officer Kit Callahan, now in charge of the plane after the death of the pilot; Molly Hernandez, a flight attendant trying to keep an eye on Maia, an unaccompanied minor; and and Ruth and Ira Belkin, who just celebrated 55 years of marriage. And back in Honolulu is the one person who is best qualified to engineer a successful rescue effort, Chris Kent, a professional diver who happens to be Shannon’s mom and Will’s estranged wife. (Of course!) You might want to wait to read this one if your vacay plans include over-water air travel. Everyone else: dig in.

All The Sinners Bleed, by S.A. Cosby

I love a resonant crime story, well-told, and this one is top notch. It takes place in the fictional Charon County, Virginia, which has a long history of violence, racism, and fundamentalist Christianity. Former F.B.I. agent Titus Crown is the county’s first Black sheriff, and he’s kept busy trying to deal with the usual small-town conflicts, the area’s drug problems, and a planned march by the Sons of the Confederacy. Then comes a report of a school shooting. The gunman, Latrell Macdonald, is a local young man, and he had a single target — Mr. Spearman, a teacher whom everyone seemed to love. But before being killed by the police, Macdonald makes reference to horrible things he was forced to do by Spearman and a mysterious masked man. Phone and computer searches turn up appalling images of child abuse, and of the torture and murder of young Black people. Under growing pressure from county bureaucrats and citizens, who have their own preconceptions about Macdonald and Spearman, Crown and his deputies rush to find the third murderer before he kills again. (Slight spoiler: there are more murders as the killer tries to cover his trail, and the crime scenes are pretty gruesome, if that kind of thing bugs you.) Crown’s investigations take him into every pocket of town, from the small factories that fuel the town’s economy to an isolated church whose racist pastor handles snakes. This was my favorite vacation read, and I am now working my way through Cosby’s backlist.