Cathryn_Conroy

As much as this is a gripping page-turner, it is also an incredibly thoughtful, profound, and philosophical novel about the power, future, impact, and horror of the emergent field of artificial intelligence as it takes over so many aspects of our lives—like it or not.

Written by Bruce Holsinger, this family drama is peppered with suspense, secrets, and a smart storyline that will keep you glued to the novel.

A wealthy and privileged family of five is traveling from their home in tony Bethesda, Maryland in an AI-controlled minivan to son Charlie's lacrosse tournament on the Eastern Shore of Delaware. In a few months, handsome and athletic 17-year-old Charlie is headed to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on a lacrosse scholarship. Charlie is driving…well, the AI system is actually driving, but Charlie is in the driver's seat. Riding shotgun is Charlie's dad, Noah Cassidy, an attorney for one of the top law firms in the country. But unlike many of his colleagues, Noah grew up with little money and attended less-than-prestigious schools. Riding in the backseat is the children's mother, Lorelei Shaw, a brilliant, double Ph.D. who is a world-renowned expert on artificial intelligence ethics and its future. Next to her is Alice, the middle child at age 13, and behind her in the very back is the youngest, Izzy, age 10.

As they are tooling along on a Delaware highway, it is Alice—not Charlie, whose head is down looking at his phone—who sees what is about to happen. A Honda Accord traveling in the opposite lane is crossing over and is about to hit them head-on. Alice screams. Charlie reacts to his sister's scream, but not quickly enough. Because Charlie jerked the wheel in a futile attempt to avoid the crash, the AI autonomous-mode controls switched off and did not take evasive action. The two cars collide, and the elderly passengers in the other car are killed, burned to death. Only Charlie and Noah escape without injuries. The Delaware State Police investigation begins. (This is not a spoiler. All of this happens in the opening pages and sets the premise for the rest of the book.)

So who is to blame for the fatal collision? Who has culpability? Is Charlie at fault for vehicular homicide? Could he land in prison for the next 20 years? Or is Noah to blame, as the responsible adult in the front seat? And the biggest question of all: What is the difference between legal guilt and moral responsibility?

In an attempt to recover emotionally and physically from the crash's horrors, the family retreats for one week to an isolated summer cottage on the Chesapeake Bay located on Virginia's Northern Neck. Nearby is a mammoth estate, a ridiculously ostentatious mansion owned by an AI billionaire named Daniel Monet. As the two families interact, beginning with Charlie falling head over heels for Daniel's 18-year-old daughter, Eurydice, secrets start to unravel—secrets big and small and some so big, so dark, and so insidious that they could tear apart the family.

This is a super-timely novel that has a fast-paced, compelling plot and a provocative, thoughtful message. In addition to being the perfect summertime read, it's ideal for book clubs because there is so much to discuss.

And for what it's worth: When I was not reading, I often thought to myself, "Oooh! I want to go read that book 'Calamity."" Except that is not the title. The title is "Culpability," but it might could also have been subtitled "Calamity." Because for this family, what happens is truly a calamity…a catastrophe or disaster.

This is a big family saga about secrets—big, scandalous secrets—that are so devastating and so shameful that their revelation will not only ruin a respected family's reputation in a close-knit community, but also destroy lives.

Written by M.L. Stedman, this is the story of the MacBride family, who for generations have operated the sheep station Meredith Downs in Western Australia, breeding some 20,000 sheep for wool and meat. They own nearly one million acres of land in an arid, harsh and unforgiving climate prone to drought, cyclone windstorms, and excess heat.

The novel opens on January 10, 1958 when Phil MacBride and his two sons, Warren and Matt, are driving on their massive property. A tragic accident with a kangaroo leaves Phil and Warren dead. Matt survives—barely. This is not a spoiler as it happens in the opening pages and sets the scene for the rest of the book. Until then, the MacBrides were a blessed family. And then everything changed one hot summer morning.

Meanwhile, Rose, the only daughter and middle child, harbors a secret about that tragic day—a secret that explains why she wasn't in the vehicle instead of Matt. As Matt slowly recovers, Rosie is filled with guilt and remorse, and does everything she can to help her little brother regain some foothold on his former life. It is during this time that something horrific happens, and the consequences will last for decades to come.

Life goes on. But is there hope? Is there forgiveness? Is there honesty? Each character grapples with the past and what it means for the future in a way that is both profound and promising because grounding everything is the solidity of family—in all its incarnations.

One persistent theme in the novel is memory, as well as those things we forget. One of the children in the novel coins a term that I love: "forgetment." It's the opposite of memories; rather, it's those things we don't remember. And do our forgetments figure into our ability to forgive others and ourselves?

This is a deeply sorrowful and melancholy book that celebrates human resilience, emotional endurance, and the everlasting power of abiding family love.

Important Note No. 1: This novel is VERY slow to get revved up. Very, very slow. If you're the kind of reader who will give a book about 50 pages and then toss it aside if you're not enjoying it, resist that temptation with this one. It (finally) picks up about 100 pages in, and from then on it's excellent. Just give it time.

Important Note No. 2: You will learn far more about Australian sheep stations than you probably ever wanted to know. Just wade through it. The story that lays atop all this information is well worth it.

Desperate times. Even more desperate people. What would you do to feed your family and keep your loved ones safe if everything around you was collapsing?

Written by Megha Majumdar, this remarkable, multilayered novel takes place in the near future in Kolkata, India where temperatures have soared so high that the vegetation is dying, fish are swimming away to cooler waters, water is a precious commodity, and people are fleeing in droves. Those who are left are suffering from heat, hunger, and hopelessness.

Ma and her elderly father, Dadu, live in the house in which Dadu grew up. Mishti is a happy, precocious two-year-old, oblivious to the suffering all around her. The small three-generation family is preparing to move to Ann Arbor, Michigan where Ma's husband awaits them. They are climate refugees, securing the valuable and long-awaited passports and visas that will allow them entry into the United States. Their booked flight leaves in seven days. In the middle of the night one week before their departure, a thief breaks into their home, stealing not only the precious food they have hoarded and hidden, but also Ma's purse in which the prized passports, much of their money, and her cell phone are stored. When they awaken in the morning and discover the robbery, their small, safe world collapses.

The thief is Boomba, a teenager who has fled from the country to the city to try to make a better life for his parents and beloved baby brother, Robi, who are currently living under a leaky tarp. Boomba was essentially Robi's guardian, the one the little boy loved most in the world. Once he gets to the city, Boomba has a series of misadventures in which he gets work, makes money, and loses the money. He sleeps in a shelter, and it is there that he sees Ma—and what he sees is startling. Ma, who works in the shelter, is stealing food meant to go to the shelter's residents. He follows her home to rob her of the food. Boomba quickly sells the twice-stolen food; he also swiped the purse and tosses most of its contents into a garbage hillock, including the passports.

And so this haunting, almost thriller-like story begins. Ma and Boomba are both guardians and thieves. Will they be able to save themselves? Even if they are moral and ethical humans at heart, what is the breaking point when a fight for survival is paramount? This is a very close-up and personal look at the havoc and disaster wreaked by climate change.

And the ending? It is devastating and gut-wrenching. I never saw it coming, but it's a perfect statement on the ultimate meaning of the book.

With unexpected plot twists and wrenching emotional insights, this book is as much a chilling warning for the future as it is a gripping page-turner in the present.

Just a thought…a haunting, disturbing thought: I think of myself as a kind and compassionate person. I think that is who Ma was—in the before times. Who do we become when we are desperate? Who Ma becomes is frightening. Is that what happens?

He was barely a grown-up…really just a boy. He made one unwise decision, accepting a ride with friends who ended up robbing a liquor store and killing the White owner. Before he died, the owner shot back and killed the two Black robbers, leaving the boy/man standing there amidst the carnage. Guilty! And sentenced to die in the electric chair.

Written by Ernest J. Gaines, this elegiac novel is the story of that young Black man named Jefferson, in the months following his trial and before his execution. It is 1948, and segregation is the law of the land in Cajun country. While he is being held in the sordid and wretched small town jail of (fictional) Bayonne, Louisiana, Jefferson's godmother Miss Emma, whom he calls Nannan, asks her best friend's nephew, Grant Wiggins, to regularly visit Jefferson. In a misguided and deeply hurtful attempt to help his client, Jefferson's defense attorney told the all-white male jury that Jefferson was nothing more than a hog. And who would put a hog in the electric chair? The argument failed to win Jefferson an acquittal and only served to change his own opinion of himself.

Meanwhile, Jefferson has sunk into a deep depression, barely eating or sleeping, and yelling out about being nothing more than a hog. It is Grant's job to try to turn him into a man before he meets his death, a job Grant is reluctant to do. Grant is a teacher—his nickname among the Blacks in his tightknit community is Professor—and he is struggling in his job to teach all the Black children in one room in the church's sanctuary.

And now he must give a man who has been sentenced to death a lesson on living, to help Jefferson regain a sense of dignity and self-respect that he lost in the courtroom when he was so harshly labeled a hog. The lesson they both learn is something filled with grace and redemption—and power!—as both men realize that Jefferson has only one freedom left as he languishes in chains and in a lonely cell: He has the ability to choose whether he accepts death or not. His freedom is in the power of his mind.

This is a worthwhile novel to read—it is listed in "1,000 Books to Read Before You Die: A Life-Changing List," by James Mustich—but it is also a tough book to read not only because it is inherently tragic and deeply sad, but also because of the overt and cruel racism that affects all the Black characters.

Emotionally searing and deeply tragic, this is a novel filled with difficult, heartbreaking truths about living and dying—and most of all, loving.

Where ever you are going on vacation this summer—road trip, beach, mountains, hiking the Appalachian Trail—this is the book for you. Oh, wait. Nix the AT. If you're hiking that, you might not want to read this thriller about Valerie Gillis, a 42-year-old registered nurse, nicknamed Sparrow, who hiked the Appalachian Trail to help heal and recover from Covid trauma and then…disappeared some 200 miles from her final destination at the northern terminus of the trail. Poof! She just seemingly vanished into the unforgiving wilderness of Maine.

Written by Amity Gaige, this is a twisty-turny, suspenseful thriller as hundreds of trained searchers on foot, as well as planes, helicopters, and K-9 teams, comb hundreds of acres of deeply forested woods, streams, and ridges in Maine during two weeks in August. Why did Sparrow veer off the Appalachian Trail? Was it a simple mistake or did something more sinister happen to her? As each day passes, her chances of living through this greatly diminish.

The story, which is more of a slow-burn than it is action-packed, is told primarily in the first-person by Maine State Game Warden Beverly Miller, a 57-year-old single woman who has devoted her 30-year career to finding lost people in the treacherous, deep forests of Maine. But we also learn tidbits about Sparrow from the journal entries she makes—a journal that is later found with her abandoned backpack.

And as much as this is a thriller against time to find a missing hiker and the quest for wilderness survival at its most basic level, it is also a love story about mothers and daughters and the many joys and complications of this relationship.

This beautifully written novel is so much more than a compelling page-turner that will keep you up past your bedtime. It is also introspective. Gaige has fleshed out the characters so we get to know their backstories, their hopes and dreams, and their crushing disappointments.

Taut, thoughtful, and simmering with tension, this is a gripping summer read.

This is a difficult book to read. The story is heartbreaking, if not devastatingly tragic with very little to lighten it—until the end. But in addition, its form, structure, and plotline make it a challenge to read.

That said, it's a profound and important book by one of our country's most talented writers. It's message is vital.

Written by Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison, this short novel is designed to be a literary form of musical jazz, especially the improvisation, invention, and rhythm of that musical genre. As a reader, you will definitely know when she is improvising because the storyline can go off the rails into new and uncharted territory. Someone could be thinking or talking about THIS…and then without warning the story swerves and then it's not THIS, but THAT. There are no chapter breaks, making the text seem rather breathless. But stick with it because it's brilliant—even if it means rereading whole sections to figure out what just happened.

This is primarily the story of Joe and Violet Trace, who fled the poverty and Jim Crow laws of the rural South to arrive in Harlem. It's the 1920s, and life on the streets is at fever pitch. For the first time in his decades-long marriage, Joe has an affair. His new beloved is an 18-year-old girl named Dorcas. The novel opens just after Joe has murdered Dorcas, and at her funeral Violet—just learning of the affair—tries to knife the corpse in the face. (This is not a spoiler. It happens on the first page.)

The rest of the novel, which jumps around in time and location, examines how Joe and Violet got to this point and how they are now suffering without redemption or hope after such a vicious act as they try to ascertain who they are and their place in the world. Both of them, especially Violet, become obsessed with Dorcas. The couple may have physically fled the South, but the vestiges of slavery still have a hold on their souls.

A mysterious narrator who may or may not be reliable but is supposed to mirror the improvisational nature of jazz adds to the mystery—and perplexity—of the book.

This novel is masterful, brilliant, and daring. It is also audacious, fearless, and gutsy. Read it, but read it slowly and carefully.

Bonus: Do read the foreword by Toni Morrison as it elucidates her thinking and purpose in writing this book, which is said to be her favorite of the 11 novels she wrote.

A fun note: From February 18, 2026 through February 18, 2027, Ohio is celebrating the life, literature, and legacy of Toni Morrison, a native of Lorain, Ohio and the first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

In the hands of a lesser writer, this book would have been totally different. The basic plot point that undergirds it all is so shocking and horrific that most writers would have made that the primary focus, but author Bill Clegg instead uses it as the small central hub of a wheel and the spokes radiating out of that hub—the characters who are most impacted by the event—are the focus. It's brilliant.

What is that shocking and horrific plot point? It's a lovely May evening in a tony small town in Connecticut, the night before a wedding reception is to take place on the grounds of an old and storied stone house. The house is filled with sleepers—the bride and groom, the bride's father, and the longtime boyfriend of the bride's mother, who happens to be Black when everyone else is White. The house explodes, killing everyone inside. The only survivor is the bride's mother, June, who was outside, having fallen asleep beneath the wedding reception tent.

As tragic and horrific as that is, the point of the entire book is not the gruesome explosion. The point of the entire book is the effect the explosion and deaths have on the bride and groom's families, their closest friends, and the townspeople as each of them deals with what happens—from grief to guilt—and how they eventually find forgiveness, solace, and hope that allows them each to keep living.

Each chapter focuses on one person, bouncing around in time and place. That said, it is never confusing and always flows in exactly the way the reader would expect. Some of the characters' stories are astonishing, some made me weep, some made me happy, and all of them are remarkable in the way they are written and presented. Eventually, each character must answer this most pivotal question: What is the point of living and loving?

This is truly an extraordinary novel.

This is historical fiction that (almost) doubles as a history book. Prodigiously researched by author Kate Quinn and then mixed with a those bold human emotions of love, envy, and duty, this book about a brave young Russian woman in World War II left me stunned and enthralled.

You see, this is a story about a woman who served as a sniper, officially taking out 309 Nazi Germans and unofficially far more. This is a fascinating piece of World War II history you probably don't know.

Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko—Mila for short—is working as a senior research assistant at the Odesa Public Library while writing her dissertation in history at Kyiv State University. She lives in Kyiv, which at this time is part of the Soviet Union, with her parents and five-year-old son. Technically, she is married to Dr. Alexei Pavlichenko, but he is a cad. Attracted to young teenagers, he seduced and impregnated her when she was just 15 and fully planned to abandon her and the child. However, Mila's powerful father made sure Alexei married his daughter. But it's a marriage in name only as they never see each other. Puzzlingly, he won't divorce her, much to her frustration and chagrin.

When the Germans invade Russia and Ukraine in World War II, Mila enlists, and shocking everyone around her except for herself, she is a talented marksman. She is soon assigned to become a sniper and racks up the kills so quickly that she is dubbed Lady Death.

This novel is about her wartime experiences as a "lady sniper," fighting not only the Nazis, but also the rampant sexism in the Russian army. At times it is gritty and even brutal, but then again, this is a book about war on the front lines.

While Mila's experiences and actions in the war are all based on historical fact, there is a compelling subplot that is pure fiction but adds much tension and suspense to the book, setting Mila up for the most difficult battle of her life.

First, the real history: Mila did travel to the United States in the summer and fall of 1942 as part of a Soviet delegation of students whose goal was to convince the USA to become part of the war in Europe. The Nazis were beating the Russians, and the Russians needed American assistance—assistance that President Franklin Roosvelt was reluctant to provide since he was also waging war in Japan. During this trip, Mila and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt became good friends and confidants—a friendship that lasted for years.

Now for the fiction: The fictionalized subplot involves an unnamed marksman who is plotting to assassinate the president and set it up so it looks like Mila pulled the trigger. This secondary story is interwoven throughout the novel and then takes over the entire plot at the end, turning it into a real page-turner.

This is a well-written, highly readable story about a brave and remarkable young woman who became something she never would have except for the struggle of wartime. With plot twists and turns and a sprinkle of love and romance, this book had me spellbound. This is historical fiction at its finest.

This is one of the best books I have ever read. Yes, it's that good.

Written by Sarah Winman, this is a story about life and love, about the families in which we are born and the families we create. This is a story that captured my heart and soul and would not let go.

It is also a poetic and charming love letter to Florence, Italy. Just beware: This book will make you want to immediately book a trip to Florence—and maybe even move there.

The novel opens on August 2, 1944 somewhere in the Tuscan Hills. World War II is raging. Bombs are dropping. Life as people know it is being destroyed. We soon meet the two pivotal characters of the book: The 64-year-old spinster Evelyn Skinner, a Renaissance art expert, and Ulysses Temper (Temps for short), a young British soldier stationed nearby. Their serendipitous encounter sets the stage for a delightful novel of lives lived well and the interconnectedness of it all.

The two return to their separate lives in London. Ulysses goes back to work in a pub called the Stoat and Parot and returns to his wife, the beautiful Peg, whom he deeply loves. She doesn't feel the same way, and so begins a decades-long quest for her to find love. Because of a good deed Ulysses did while he was a soldier in Florence saving a man from suicide, he surprisingly inherits several large apartments in Florence into which he moves, along with eight-year-old Alys (a child Peg had with an American soldier who has long disappeared), his good friend Cressy, and Cressy's talking parrot, Claude. The bulk of the novel is the wonderful life they create together in Florence, initially surrounded by wary neighbors who soon enough lovingly adopt this eccentric group of Brits as their own.

Each character is richly and deeply depicted—so real, so alive, so fully animate that I wanted to live with them—be their friend, be their family, be with them.

This is a delightful and imaginative book that celebrates life, love, family, and art, especially Renaissance art. It is extraordinarily well written with humor, joy, and breathtaking descriptions of nature and food (oh the food!). The writing ranges from casual and witty to lyrical and poetic. It is perfect!

Bonus for English majors: There are fun and creative parallels to the pensione in E.M. Forster's "A Room With a View" with Mr. Forster himself making a major appearance at the end of the book.

This brilliant and magical novel is a treasure and a literary gift. I am in awe of this book!

This is a chilling and ferocious novel that had me captivated from the first page. It is a study in the brutal savageness of evil contrasted with the beauty and purity of love.

Written by the Irish feminist Edna O'Brien and published when she was 85 years old, this is the story of Fidelma McBride, a beautiful married woman living in the remote rural Irish village of Cloonoila. She yearns for a baby, but only suffers miscarriages. One cold winter day, a stranger comes to town—a handsome white-haired, bearded man who introduces himself as Dr. Vladimir Dragan. He specializes in New Age alternative healing and needs an apartment to rent and an office for his practice. His calm, knowledgeable demeanor bewitches the people of Cloonoila, especially the women and most especially of all Fidelma.

In a small town, nothing is secret for long, including Vlad and Fidelma's relationship. But the bigger and more stunning secret is Vlad's past: He is a vicious war criminal in hiding, wanted for the mass murder of thousands in Sarajevo. After his true identity is discovered, he is arrested and whisked away to The Hague to be placed on trial for his crimes. It is then that Fidelma's very life hangs in the balance when her relationship to him is discovered by outsiders who are tracking Vlad. What happens to her is the stuff of our worst nightmares. The second half of the book is how she rebuilds her life after the trauma of suffering not only horrific physical violence but also disgrace and humiliation from the only people she knows.

This is a book that is gripping and compelling, but also startling and horrifying. The opening chapters feel like some kind of sweet Irish fairy tale, but quickly enough the tale becomes a bit disquieting and then troubling and finally takes a dark and shocking turn. It feels almost feral if novels can be described as such.

Just a note of explanation: The title refers to the 11,541 red chairs laid out in rows on April 6, 2012 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the start of the siege of Sarajevo by Bosnian Serb forces. On empty chair for each Sarajevan killed during the siege that lasted 1,425 days. In addition, 653 small red chairs represented the children who were murdered.

Warning: There are a number of extremely graphic scenes of violence. Just know that before you decide to read this incredible—albeit harrowing--novel.

This 1980 short story by Toni Morrison—the only one she ever wrote—is a kind of puzzle game for readers that will make each of us examine our deepest stereotypes about race.

This is the story of Twyla and Roberta, who are both eight years old, frightened, and lonely. Their mothers have taken them (or in the girls' parlance, dumped them) to the St. Bonaventure shelter for what amounts to four months. They arrive the same day, and unlike all the others there, they are not orphans; their mothers are still alive. Twyla and Roberta become roommates, and because they are shunned by the others, they become fast friends. The story continues far into the future when the girls meet again by chance four times as adults—the first time passing rudely like strangers and the rest of the times like the best friends they were all those years earlier.

This is the puzzle for readers: One of the girls is White. And the other is Black. But Morrison never tells us which is which, and so many of the "hints" she provides could go either way. She explicitly intended to remove all racial codes from the narrative.

The introduction by Zadie Smith is longer than the short story, but do take the time to read it. Because it appears before the story, I read it first, but I wish now that I had read it later. It is filled with much wisdom and smart analysis, but it also sets up the story a bit too well, a bit too thoroughly. Translation: There are some spoilers.

Smith says that Morrison called "Recitatif" an experiment, and the subject of that experiment is us—the readers. Both girls seem to be White and then Black and then White again. It all depends on your personal perception. Smith wisely asserts that a reader's attempts to figure it out says more about the reader than the character.

This is interesting: In the footnotes, Smith cites literary critic Elizabeth Abel, who claims that most White readers see Twyla as White, while most Black readers see Twyla as Black. Well, which is it? You get to decide.

Smith asserts, and I heartily agree, that "Recitatif" is a perfect short story—in the same league as Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery"—and something that should be read by everyone.

Lauren Groff is one of my favorite authors of all time. Her 2015 novel "Fates and Furies" is still on my top 10 list of favorite books, and since I added it in 2016, I have read more than 1,000 books that could have surpassed it, but none did.

And this collection of nine short stories, despite the somewhat odd title and cover design, is spectacular. Each story is a portrayal of good and evil—often in the same person. Some of the stories made me smile, many of them gave me the shivers, and all of them were a joy to read. Groff has a special kind of insight into the human condition and how we treat each other—for better or worse.

The stories cover the gamut from time (the 1950s to the present day), character ages (teens to seniors), and locations (New England to Florida to California to New York,)

My favorites (and it was difficult to choose!):
• "What's the Time, Mr. Wolf?": Chip is a young boy when the story opens and a grown man at the end. He is part of a large, wealthy, and prestigious New England family. Their expectations for him are quite high, but he is largely ignored by everyone except his older sister. With no one paying particular attention to him, he descends into partying and booze, but always manages the gentleman's C. Eventually, it catches up with him, and his stint in "rehab" is to be shipped off to the desolate family manse in the wilds of New Hampshire—all alone.

• "Birdie": Three high school friends who have long since lost touch with each other, gather for a weekend at the hospital bedside of Birdie, the fourth member of the group. Birdie is dying of cancer. They all have secrets and regrets, but the focus of this story is on Nichole, who makes a stunning confession of something that happened one summer long ago.

• "The Wind": This is a heartbreaking and somewhat terrifying story of a mother and her three children trying to escape the husband/father, employed as a police officer, who is abusing them. It's a testament to mother love.

• "To Sunland": After their parents have both died, Joanie determines to take her mentally-challenged brother, Buddy, to an institution in Florida before she leaves for college in Maine. This is the story of their bus trip south.

With vivid characters, sharp plot points, and writing that simply sings, this is a captivating and remarkable collection of short stories, and exactly what I would have expected from the inimitable Lauren Groff.

There are no primary sources. Everything we know about Cleopatra, who died a generation before Christ was born, is the stuff of legend, gossip, and mythology. So what is a serious biographer to do?

Relying heavily on the Greek biographer and philosopher Plutarch, who wrote 100-plus years after Cleopatra's death, as well as the Roman historian Lucius Cassius Dio, who wrote some 200 years after the queen's death, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Stacy Schiff has valiantly separated the legend of Cleopatra from her history to offer what is likely the most accurate historical account we will ever have.

Tip: Get William Shakespeare and Elizabeth Taylor out of your brain!

Cleopatra is arguably among the most famous and the most powerful women to have ever lived, ruling Egypt for 22 years. To get to the throne, she had her four siblings summarily murdered—and she was married in succession to two of her brothers. She fell in love with Julius Caesar, with whom she had a son, and after his murder at the hands of his most trusted advisors, she fell in love with Mark Antony. This storied romance resulted in three children and the eventual demise of Egypt as it became a Roman province. The two lovers died by suicide.

Some insist she ruled by her sexual prowess and feminine wiles, but the story is more complicated. Cleopatra was brilliant—smart, savvy, and politically shrewd. She was also extremely wealthy and arguably far more powerful than most (all?) of the male heads of state in her time. Indeed, much of her life really was dramatic and spectacular, and far later in the future it lent itself to the stage and movies. But there was more to it than that, and this is where Schiff's research and writing skills particularly shine.

This is a real history book and reads as such, so some parts of it are a bit dense. But the story of Cleopatra's life is fascinating, and Schiff is a master at not reducing her to the sum of her sex life, as has so often been done before. Cleopatra accomplished so much more as Egypt's proficient ruler than her erotic personal life seems to allow in all the retellings.

It's an intriguing tale of sex, power, and death.

Advice: Do read the footnotes! They aren't bibliographic citations, but rather extra pieces of the story that range from insightful to hilarious to salacious.

Oh. This. Book. When the world around you is falling apart, this is the book you should read. It is literary comfort food for the soul.

You will smile. You might even laugh. And you will likely tear up. And eventually you will finish it, gently close it, and sigh.

Beautifully written by Allen Levi, this is the story of Theo (just Theo), a wealthy 86-year-old gentleman who was born and raised in Portugal and has lived all over the world. And now for mysterious reasons, he has arrived on a sunny spring morning in the small Georgia town of Golden where he gently and compassionately touches the hearts and souls of many of the residents. After renting a third-floor walk-up apartment on top of the Ponder Building, which is owned by one Mr. James Ponder whom Theo employs as a kind of business manager for secretive reasons that will eventually be revealed.

Theo frequents the local coffee shop, called The Chalice, and sees on its walls 92 hand-drawn portraits of Golden residents. The portraits are intricate works of art by a local artist named Asher Glisson and each one is for sale. Theo has an idea! He will buy them one-by-one and present them to the person depicted in portrait. He writes each person a beautiful handwritten letter on exquisite stationery, requesting a meeting on a bench facing the river along the town's promenade. Although most are skeptical and even alarmed by this request from a total stranger—is this a scam?—they show up and are astounded by the gift and the conversation with Theo. So many of them reveal their deepest secrets and desires to this gracious old man. Lives are changed when Theo touches them.

As much as this is obviously a story of the joy of giving, it is just as much a story of faces. Looking at faces—really looking, not just a passing glance—is how we humans truly get to know one another. As one character says in the book, "God gave us faces so we can see each other better."

While it can be a bit sappy at times, this is a simple story with a simple plot and a powerful message of love and compassion.

Bonus: This book has the BEST dedication, sure to make you smile.

The demise of a marriage is almost always a tragedy. And the disintegration of the marriage of author Belle Burden and her pseudonymously-named husband in this tell-all, bare-all, confess-all book is tragic. But it also reads like a well-written celebrity gossip column with all the inside scoop.

While the book is a gripping page-turner, it also takes some deep breaths and maybe a few eyerolls before we readers can take it all seriously. You see, Belle and her ex-husband were/are uber-rich. Belle is an aristocratic heiress (the Vanderbilt family) with a trust fund and a Harvard law degree. And she's the poor one in the union! The Husband makes millions as a hedge fund trader, they own a posh New York City apartment, and a house on Martha's Vineyard with access to a private club and private beaches. The three children attend expensive private schools. It's all a bit much for the average Joe to behold. But once I got past the glittering riches, I found their love story to be enchanting, while how it all ended is heartbreaking.

They truly were in love. Married 20 years, Belle, The Husband, and two of their three children fled from New York City to their beach house on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts in March 2020 when the Covid pandemic first hit. (Their son was staying with a friend whose parents—and those parents must now have a sure ticket to heaven—hosted a bunch of teenagers for months in their home.)

Soon after arriving on Martha's Vineyard, Belle received an ominous text message from an unknown number. The man writing the text informed her that his wife and her husband were having an affair, and his wife had just tried to kill herself. When Belle confronted The Husband, he confessed all and instead of saying it meant nothing, he left her. Just. Like. That. What's more, he refused to talk about it. He simply said, "I feel like a switch has flipped. I'm done." And he was. He not only didn't want anything to do with Belle, but also wanted nothing to do with their three children.

The book is then the details of what happened, who did what to whom, who said what to whom, and trying to figure out the biggest question of all—WHY?

Instead of being sordid, it's sympathetic. Instead of being hateful, it's haunting. Instead of being insipid, it's insightful.

Reading more like a novel than a memoir, the book is an intimate look behind the locked doors of a failed marriage and a life that is reborn and reinvented—albeit with the help of a lot of money in the bank.

This three-generational family epic is a poignant and perceptive story of mothers and daughters—the love and affection, as well as the anger and antagonism. It is a story that begins in Puerto Rico, continues to St. Louis and New York, and ends in our hearts.

Written by Jeanine Cummins, the novel takes place from the 1950s to 2023, bouncing—often jarringly—from decade to decade and character to character. It is the opposite of a linear, chronological tale, and we readers really need to sit up and pay attention or risk getting lost.

The novel opens in 2023 in Palisades, New York when Ruth, the widowed mother of two, finds out that her daughter Daisy, who has moved to San Juan instead of going to college, was gravely injured during a hurricane. Ruth would do anything to be there with her daughter, but all the flights have been canceled. The story then abruptly backs up to 1968 in San Juan on Ruth's parents' wedding day, a wedding with an inauspicious beginning as Peter Brennan's Irish-American family wants nothing to do with his marrying Puerto Rican Rafaela Acuña y Daubón. The novel backs up again to Rafaela's storied childhood in San Juan, the precious daughter of wealthy and devoted parents who lose everything just as she is about to finish high school.

Rafaela and Ruth eventually get to Daisy's bedside in San Juan, the place where their family story began and they consider all the choices and decisions throughout the years that got them to where they are now. The latter part of the book quickly becomes much like a soap opera—granted, it's a page-turner—but it's still a bit over the top and histrionic in emotion and pulls on the heartstrings.

At the center of this novel, is the question of identity—not only ethnic identity but also identity within a family. Who are we? Where do we truly belong? It's also a love story—romantic love and family love.

My qualm with the book is the format. Jumping around in time and character is a common tool for writers, but it takes great expertise on the part of the author or it can be confusing and disorienting for readers. Proper segues are vitally important, and Cummins doesn't do that, so it feels like a lot of hard stops from chapter to chapter.

That said, this is a compelling and thoughtful book with a story that is told with candor and compassion.

Reason No. 1 I Read This Book: From February 18, 2026 through February 18, 2027, Ohio is celebrating the life, literature, and legacy of Toni Morrison, a native of Lorain, Ohio and the first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. I recently moved back to Ohio, so I want to join in this celebration and plan to read several of Morrison's books this year, starting with this one.

Reason No. 2 I Read This Book: I read banned books. And it's hard to come up with a title that has been challenged more frequently over a longer period of time than "The Bluest Eye."

Published in 1970, this debut novel from author Toni Morrison is an emotional punch in the heart as it shows how racism is insidiously internalized by young Black girls and then poisons the rest of their lives. It's bold and brazen. It's searing and seductive. It's tender and tough. And I was spellbound from page one.

This is the story of three Black girls in 1940 and 1941 in Lorain, Ohio. Claudia, who is nine, narrates the story. Her sister Frieda is 10, but seems years old and wiser. And their friend Pecola Breedlove, who is 11, is the primary character, the one who thinks of herself as being so ugly that she also feels hideous inside. She believes that having blue eyes will make her beautiful, and she prays to God every day that her wish will be granted. While Claudia and Frieda are poor, they are truly loved and cherished by their parents. Pecola, who lives in a family filled with violence and abject poverty, is severely abused as she is raped and impregnated by her father, Cholly.

The ending, which is a literary feat unto itself, is heartbreaking as Pecola, who just a little girl, descends into madness as the adults around her so severely betrayed and harmed her.

This piercing, brilliant novel takes readers into the legacy of slavery and the very heart of racism. The writing is hauntingly lyrical and emotionally devastating—and should be required reading for all of us.

This novel is historical fiction. It is based on fact. And that is exactly what makes the story so hard to read. It is appalling. And its roots, its grounding, are all true. Prepare to be horrified.

That said, it's vitally important that we read books like this that expose what can happen when unfair, detrimental, and discriminating laws are randomly enacted and enforced. In this case, it was the Chamberlain-Kahn Act, otherwise known as the American Plan, that was enacted in 1918 and continued into the 1950s and legally permitted military, police, and health officers to arrest any woman suspected of prostitution.

Mind you, a young woman could be accused of prostitution just because she chose to live alone, chose to eat dinner in a restaurant by herself, or was pretty or unmarried. Husbands who were bored or angry with their wives could turn them in. There were no standards. There was no due process through the legal system. Once arrested, the woman was forced to undergo invasive testing for venereal disease and then sent to jail or to a detention center or workcamp so she could be "rehabilitated."

Set in 1941 in Kinston, North Carolina, this novel by Donna Everhart focuses on a small group of women who have been arrested for prostitution and sent to the State Industrial Farm Colony for Women. Beautiful Ruth with her long, silky black hair has graduated from high school and is living her dream of having her own apartment and a job in the local diner. While walking to work one morning, she is grabbed off the street by the sheriff and driven against her will to the Colony. Stella is smart but a social outcast. She is only 15, but her father has been visiting her bedroom at night for years. Now Stella is pregnant so her enraged mother, who assumes Stella has a no-good boyfriend, sends her off to the Colony to have her "tumor" removed.

The medical treatment received by these women is horrific. Ruth has only ever kissed one boy, but it's determined she has syphilis and is treated repeatedly with arsenic and mercury shots, the standard treatment in this time. The side effects include hair loss, nausea, and loose teeth. Stella is sterilized without her knowledge or permission.

Living in the Colony under the strict rules of the superintendent, Mrs. Dorothy Baker, some 45 women are subjected to a life that resembles a prison. How they survive and what happens to them as they are repeatedly abused and eventually fight back is the basis of this intense and superb page-turner novel that left me stunned, horrified, and angry.

WHO is the author of this book? Hmmm…never heard of him until now. In the first few pages of this novel, I was totally smitten. So I looked up this "unknown" author and found out the following: Ron Rash has written 20 books, three of which have been on the New York Times bestseller list, and he has won 20 literary awards.

Well, I got schooled, and happily so, since I intend to read a lot more Ron Rash books.

Taking place in 1951, this is a historical novel, love story, and coming of age book—all in one. Jacob Hampton is the only child of the leading citizens of Blowing Rock, North Carolina, Daniel and Cora Hampton. They own the sawmill and the general store. They consistently helped townspeople during the Great Depression, and no one has forgotten their compassion in that difficult time. But Jacob is trying to break free of their many constraints on him. He dropped out of college with the intention of working at the sawmill, and when he came home, he met Naomi Clarke, a 16-year-old from a farm near Pulaski, Tennessee, who was trying to earn some much-needed money by working as a maid at the town's most elegant hotel. Naomi has lived a hardscrabble existence, losing her mother at a young age and forced by her father to drop out of school after the third grade to work on the family farm.

It's love at first sight for Jacob and Naomi, who elope when his parents both refuse to give their blessing and with many cruel words disinherit him. Their marriage is a scandal in this small Appalachian town. And soon enough, Uncle Sam comes calling, sending Jacob to fight in the Korean War. He asks his best buddy, Blackburn Gant, a man whose face was horribly disfigured by polio, to look after Naomi while he is in the Army, knowing Naomi is spurned by most of the townspeople. By the time Jacob ships out, Naomi is pregnant with their baby.

What happens to Jacob in Korea and what happens to those left in Blowing Rock is the gist of this page-turner of a book. How far are we willing to go—even to tell the most horrific lies and mastermind the most evil of deeds—to seemingly save those we love? When will the truth be revealed?

While the twisty plot is very compelling, it is the characters who transform this story from what could have been a quick-to-forget novel to rise to the level of literature.

Best of all, the writing is brilliant. This is a book to be treasured.

This is a slow-building suspenseful thriller that soon threatens to boil over in a pressure-cooker plot that will keep you up way past your bedtime.

Written by Chris Pavone, this is the story of the Bohemia, a posh apartment building on New York City's Upper West Side that is so exclusive and private that it doesn't even have a street address on the outside of the building. We follow the stories of the doorman and the residents in two apartments, and those stories are filled with lust and love, sex and violence, intrigue and murder.

The background of the plot that soon takes centerstage is ripped from today's headlines: In separate incidents days apart, White police officers have brutally murdered two Black men, setting the city on edge. Protesters, including hordes of angry MAGA supporters in pickup trucks flying Confederate flags, are gathering in multiple places in New York City. It's a powder keg that is ready to explode.

This isn't your typical thriller. It's also a story about the political state of our big U.S. cities with all our prejudices and fury about racial and economic disparities on full display.

The characters around which the novel revolves are:
• The head doorman is Chicky Diaz, a middle-aged man who has recently lost his beloved wife to cancer and owes lots of money to loan sharks, his landlord, and his credit card companies. He's never done this before, but the circumstances are dire. Chicky is packing a gun while on the job as the Bohemia doorman.

• Emily Merriweather Longworth and Whitaker Hamilton Longword live in the penthouse. Whit's obscene wealth, built through nefarious means, is almost as enormous as his ego. He has developed some weird sexual proclivities, but that is only one of Emily's problems. She hates her husband, but she knows she can't leave him with that iron-clad, unbreakable prenup she signed. Meanwhile, in addition to regularly volunteering in a Harlem food pantry, she is having an affair that could cost her everything—including her life or her lover's.

• Jennifer and Julian Sonnenberg live on the second floor in a modest apartment. She is a high-powered attorney, while he owns an art gallery with his best friend, Ellington, a gay Black man. While he's dealing with a potential lawsuit that could bankrupt his business, Julian has also received some somber and frightening news from his doctor.

The ending is an action-packed page-turner that is, at first, surprising and then shocking…and then disturbing once it all sinks in.

Written in a lively, narrative style with a big and bold multilayered plot and chapter-ending cliffhangers, this is a captivating novel packed with surprises and simmering tension.