Nevermore: She and Her Cat, Sisterland, Lessons from the Edge

 

Reported by Garry

 She and Her Cat: Stories by Makoto Shinkai and Naruki Nagakawa. Renowned anime director Makoto Shinkai turns his hand to prose with this touching, unusual look at cats and their relationships to their humans as well as the relationships of the humans to each other. Made up of four intertwined stories narrated by both the cats and their humans, this sweet book touched the heart of our reader.  CD

Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfield. Kate and Violet are identical twins born with psychic abilities. As they grow up and apart, Kate tries to deny and suppress her abilities, while Violet has embraced hers and is now a psychic medium. Violet starts to have premonitions of an impending earthquake devastating St. Louis, and Kate must come to grips with not only her own abilities, but her fraught relationship with her sister. Our reader states that this book begs for a sequel, and will read it in a heartbeat when it arrives. (If it arrives. We’re not psychic.)  DC

Lessons from the Edge: A Memoir by Marie Yovanovitch. “Insightful, extremely educational, and a complete page-turner” is how our reader described this memoir by the former US Ambassador to the Ukraine. Born in Canada to Russian émigré parents, Marie Yovanovitch joined the State Department and rose through the ranks in an impressive and occasionally nail-biting career that saw her serve in Somalia, Armenia, and the Ukraine, amongst others. In the middle of her third ambassadorship, she was abruptly recalled and targeted by a smear campaign, which culminated in her testifying at the first impeachment inquiry of Donald Trump.  KM

 

Also mentioned:

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

The Good Sister by Gillian McAllister

Cashelmara by Susan Howatch

A Wrexford & Sloan Historical Mystery series by Andrea Penrose

The Riviera House by Natasha Lester

After Anna by Lisa Scottoline

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

Women Talking by Miriam Toews

Fear of Flying by Erica Jong

Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death, and Brain Surgery by Henry Marsh

The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner

Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller's Tragic Quest by Carl Hoffman

Last Things by C.P. Snow

Life on the Mississippi by Rinker Buck

City Under One Roof by Iris Yamashita

Observations by Gaslight: Stories from the World of Sherlock Holmes by Lyndsay Faye

Finlay Donovan is Killing It by Elle Cosimano