Murder in Plain Sight by Marta Perry

Title: Murder in Plain Sight

Publisher: Harlequin
Imprint: HQN
Pub Date: 11/30/2010
ISBN: 9780373774722
Author: Marta Perry
Category: FICTION - ADULT: Other: Religious

"There are secrets buried in Amish country...

Did a sweet-faced Amish teenager brutally murder a young woman? To save her career, big-city lawyer Jessica Langdon is determined to defend him—against the community’s bitter and even violent outrage. Yet without an understanding of Amish culture, Jessica must rely on arrogant businessman Trey Morgan, who has ties to the Amish community...and believes in the boy’s guilt.

Jessica has threats coming from all sides: a local fanatic, stirred up by the biased publicity of the case; the dead girl’s boyfriend; even from the person she’s learned to trust the most, Trey Morgan. But just when Jessica fears she’s placed her trust in the wrong man, Trey saves her life. And now they must both reach into a dangerous past to protect everyone’s future—including their own."

Once again I have been fortunate enough to receive a pre-publication galley to read and review via netGalley, however I have no obligation to either netGalley or the publisher to produce a favourable review of the book. The following opinions are my own.

Murder in Plain Sight is an enjoyable read.

Jessica Langdon travels to a quiet Pennsylvanian farming community with instructions from her boss to secure a quick and clean plea bargain for a teen accused of murder in what appears to be a straightforward open and shut case. Quickly, however, Jessica becomes convinced that there is more to the case than first appears, and becomes determined to investigate and provide her client with the best possible defence.

A mysterious suicide, a Pennsylvania Dutch hex symbol, death threats and the complicated love-life of the victim combine to make Jessica's job difficult and dangerous. Not to mention the fact that she is finding herself attracted to the infuriatingly bossy Trey Morgan.

This book is not a nail-bitingly suspenseful thriller, or a complex legal drama. It is, however, a pleasant read with a little bit of mystery and a little bit of romance.

I was drawn to Murder in Plain Sight because I thought I would enjoy reading a novel set in and around an Amish community. The setting  did contribute to the story, and I learned some things about the Amish that I did not previously know. I would have enjoyed a more demanding mystery or a more heartfelt romance, or both! I felt that the author treated both the mystery and the romance too superficially for my liking. Certainly I prefer my reading material to be a bit deeper and more thought-provoking than this novel.

Murder in Plain Sight is a light, quick read that will appeal to readers of cozy mysteries.

Stranger Here Below by Joyce Hinnefeld

Title: Stranger Here Below
Publisher: Unbridled Books
Pub Date: 09/28/2010
ISBN: 9781609530044
Author: Joyce Hinnefeld
Category: FICTION - ADULT: Literary

In 1961, when Amazing Grace Jansen, a firecracker from Appalachia, meets Mary Elizabeth Cox, the daughter of a Black southern preacher, at Kentucky's Berea College, they already carry the scars and traces of their mothers' troubles. Poor and single, Maze's mother has had to raise her daughter alone and fight to keep a roof over their heads. Mary Elizabeth's mother has carried a shattering grief throughout her life, a loss so great that it has disabled her and isolated her stern husband and her brilliant, talented daughter.

The caution this has scored into Mary Elizabeth has made her defensive and too private and limited her ambitions, despite her gifts as a musician. But Maze's earthy fearlessness might be enough to carry them both forward toward lives lived bravely in an angry world that changes by the day.

Both of them are drawn to the enigmatic Georginea Ward, an aging idealist who taught at Berea sixty years ago, fell in love with a black man, and suddenly found herself renamed as a sister in a tiny Shaker community. Sister Georgia believes in discipline and simplicity, yes. But, more important, her faith is rooted in fairness and the long reach of unconditional love.

This is a novel about three generations of women and the love that makes families where none can be expected.

I received a pre-publication galley of this book via netGalley. I am under no obligation to the publisher and my review is my honest opinion of the book.

Before I begin my review, I must admit that I'm facing a bit of a stumbling block when it comes to reading the galleys that I receive via netGalley. Because I don't own a portable eReader of any description (no iPads, Kindles or the like reside here), my only option is to read them on my computer, which is a fairly heavy HP laptop. It is portable, so I can take it to McCafe to read with coffee, to football or gymnastics to read while the children play (though they do ask why I didn't see that fabulous goal they kicked, or the fly spring they did off the end of the tumble track!), or even to bed if I sit propped up on pillows and angle the screen just right. But it's just not the same as reading a book! Trust me to say that if I'm lucky enough to get an iPhone or a Kobo or such, then I'll be the one who gets sand in it at the beach, or drops it in the bath. I like to read anywhere, anytime! Having to sit up straight at a desk or table of some sort to read a novel just doesn't make me feel like I'm reading for pleasure, and my laptop doesn't do so well on my lap! I guess what I'm saying is that sometimes it feels a bit too much like work to read galleys to review.

Anyway, on to what I think of Stranger Here Below.

The book opens in 1968, with a letter written by Maze to her best friend Mary Elizabeth. She speaks of her sadness, loneliness and regret, and of her fears for the future.

We then go back to the beginning, to the birth of Georginea Ward in 1872, and from there the story weaves back and forth between Maze and Mary Elizabeth, their mothers Vista and Sarah, and Georginea, who Vista and Maze live with for much of their lives.

Stranger Here Below leaves much unsaid. Fears and passions alike are buried or denied by women who face hardships and must show strength and stoicism to live day by day. Many questions are left unanswered, and much is implied rather than made explicit. For this reason, the book is an engrossing, though not easy, read.

An indication of how finely drawn Hinnefeld's character are, is the anger, frustration and tears provoked in the reader by the events that unfold. The fact that the reader feels so strongly for the characters, and empathizes with them in this way, shows just how successful the author has been.

The historical context of the novel is extremely interesting, covering as it does the Shakers (the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, known as the Shakers, is a Protestant religious sect), the Day Law (Berea College is a coeducational and desegregated school founded in 1855, admitting both blacks and whites students and treating them without discrimination. In 1904, the "Day Law" was passed by the Kentucky legislature, prohibiting any person, group of people, or corporation from the teaching of black and white students in the same school, or from running separate branches of a school for the teaching of black and white students within twenty-five miles of each other. Since at the time Berea was the only such integrated school in Kentucky, it was clearly the target of this law.), and the Vietnam War (In 1965 America officially entered the Vietnam War to fight against the will of the Vietnamese people and to support minority Vietnamese interests which were tied to American interests. 58 169 Americans were killed. Vietnam was a display of American fallibility, lack of judgment, lack of understanding of root issues, and lack of support for people to determine their own destiny and govern themselves.).

Recommended reading.

The Panic Zone by Rick Mofina

Title: The Panic Zone

Publisher: Harlequin
Imprint: Mira
Pub Date: 06/29/2010
ISBN: 9780778327943
Author: Mofina, Rick
Category: FICTION - ADULT: Mystery, Detective, Suspense & Thrillers: Thrillers

"A grieving mother and a relentless reporter pursue a perfect killer.

A CAR CRASHES IN WYOMING

A young mother is thrown clear of the devastating car crash. Dazed, she sees a figure pull her infant son from the flames. Or does she? The police believe it's a case of trauma playing cruel tricks on the mind, until the night the grief-stricken woman hears a voice through the phone: "Your baby is alive."

A BOMB EXPLODES IN A RIO DE JANEIRO CAFE

The heinous act kills ten people including two journalists with the World Press Alliance news agency. Jack Gannon's first international assignment is to find out whether his colleagues were innocent victims or targets who got too close to a huge story.

A CARIBBEAN CRUISE ENDS IN HORROR

Doctors are desperate to identify the mysterious cause of a cruise ship passenger's agonizing death. They turn to the world's top scientists who fear that someone has resurrected their long-buried secret research. Research that is now being used as a deadly weapon.

With millions of lives at stake, experts work frantically against time. And as an anguished mother searches for her child and Jack Gannon pursues the truth, an unstoppable force hurls them all into the panic zone."

I received an ARC of The Panic Zone from the publisher via NetGalley. Disclaimer: I received no compensation for this review, which is my personal opinion upon reading the galley.

The Panic Zone is a fabulous thriller. It has all the elements that I look for in a novel from this genre - a sympathetic hero who is facing almost-unbeatable odds, interesting subplots that weave together in unexpected ways, and an ever-increasing pace towards an explosive climax.

This book is a real page turner! Jack Gannon is an investigative reporter who finds that his determination to uncover the truth puts him in increasingly dangerous situations. As he travels the world in search of sources and information to get to the bottom of a bomb blast that killed two of his journalistic colleagues, he finds that the story is much, much bigger than he could have expected.

Add to this a mad scientist with plans for a drastic solution to over-population, a grieving mother who is sure that her baby is still alive, a terrorist plot, and a human-trafficking ring.

There's action aplenty, and yet I never found the plot confusing. The Panic Zone is a well-written, enjoyable and exciting read.

I highly recommend The Panic Zone as fabulous recreational reading for men and women that enjoy thrillers.