Furnish your nightstand with February reads

In her 30s, journalist Tabitha Lasley decided to leave her London gig and bad relationship and go to Scotland to write about the offshore drilling culture. She ended up in a worse relationship but did manage to write about the lives of the men, and a few women, who live the arduous life of offshore work. “Sea State” is labeled as a memoir and her personal decisions frustrated me but I was fascinated by the life of the oil workers.

 

“Assembly” by Natasha Brown is a brief, searing, flash bomb of a book. With precise phrasing, Brown looks at race, class, and how we assemble a life to outside expectations. Excellent for discussion.

 

“New York, My Village” by Uwem Akpan is a more challenging read. The Nigerian author gets a bit lost in his own story line at times, but his presentation of the New York book world is telling and the running backstory of bedbugs in a NYC sublet will have you laughing and itching simultaneously.

 

“All That She Carried” by Tiya Miles is a scholarly yet readable work that won the National Book Award. Miles tells the story of Ashley’s sack — a modest cloth bag originally given by a mother to her daughter who was being sold away from her family in slavery. Miles uses historical documentation to tell the poignant, intimate story of the enslaved people. This story originated in Charleston. I urge everyone to read this remarkable book.

 

“Small Things Like These” by Claire Keegan is set in a small town in Ireland in 1985 when the Catholic laundries still existed to house (read punish) girls who became pregnant out of wedlock. Bill Furlong is witness to the conditions as he delivers coal to the nuns. This book is quietly uplifting. 

 

If you are looking for thrillers/mystery choices, here are a few:

 

“Never Saw me Coming” by Vera Kurlan involves sociopathic college students looking for a killer on campus and wondering which of them it may be. 

 

“Twenty Years Later” by Charlie Donlea is a clever look at fugitive(s), journalism, and loyalty. A fun read — I identified some of the perpetrators but not all. A satisfying ending with a dangling moral issue.

 

“Family Business” by S.J. Rozan is a thriller set in NYC’s Chinatown. This is part of the Lydia Chin/Bill Smith PI series, though the first I have read. Fast paced and breezy, but the descriptions of the food will have you ordering out. Family machinations are entertaining in all cultures, these come with a dead body.

 

“The Replacement Wife” by Darby Kane will make a great Netflix movie. The protagonist is recovering from a trauma and can’t seem to clear her head but she knows something is amiss. Why won’t anyone listen to her? A twisty revenge story.

 

And for all of you William Kreuger Smith fans, “The Incredible Winston Browne” by Sean Dietrich is a nostalgic charmer set in small town Florida in the 1950s. 

 

Go to beckysbookclub.com to see all past articles and more reviews.