The Paragon Hotel by Lyndsay Faye

First Line: You're supposing that you hold in your hands a manuscript.

Suffering from an untended gunshot wound, former New York City resident Alice "Nobody" James is taken to Portland, Oregon's Paradise Hotel by Max, one of the black Pullman porters.

Her sanctuary turns out to be the only all-black hotel in the city, and its lodgers are none too happy about having a white woman on the premises. As she recuperates, she becomes acquainted with the residents and begins to understand why they dread her presence. The Ku Klux Klan has arrived in great numbers-- burning crosses, inciting violence, and brutalizing blacks. It's their presence that makes searching for a missing black child extremely difficult, but Alice insists on helping to find the boy.

The longer she stays, the more Alice learns. The Paragon Hotel is chockful of secrets, and nightclub singer Blossom Fontaine seems to be at the center of all of them.

In my travels east of the Mississippi, I'd often wondered at the proliferation of places called "Dew Drop Inn" or "Step Right Inn," mostly because there wasn't a thing about them that looked like an inn, hotel, motel, or bed-and-breakfast. All these places looked like bars or saloons to me. Well, thanks to Lyndsay Faye's The Paragon Hotel, I now know about the Raines law of 1896 and why so many bars and saloons changed their names. Other than this (and learning about Bayer's heroin tablets-- oh my), I found the book to be a mixed bag of blessings.

With sentences like "Losing a safe space...carves a canyon through a person," or "Watching like a sea captain's wife searching the shores after a storm," it's obvious that Faye certainly knows how to turn a memorable phrase. She also knows how to do her research on Harlem in New York City or the slang used in 1921 or Oregon's long association with racism. Memorable characters are also a forte. You've seldom met anyone like Alice James, who prefers to be called "Nobody," and the residents of the Paragon Hotel are fascinating, especially since they've all had to learn how to live a secretive life in a city (and state) where it is illegal for blacks to reside. You'd think that, with all those people in the hotel, you'd be constantly confused, but Faye effortlessly keeps them all straight in our minds.

The way the story is told is what tripped me up. This double-pronged tale is like two cats fighting in a bag. We have to be told Alice's backstory growing up poor in Harlem, and we have to be told the present-day story in Portland. It's too much. I could've done without all the backstory and having the sole focus be on the hotel and its residents. And the 1921 slang dialogue used throughout? While it's nice to know how many people spoke then, it was too much of a good thing even though I found none of it unintelligible. Like Alice's backstory, the slang served mainly to keep me from being drawn into the story-- and I really didn't want to be an outsider. Not at the Paragon Hotel.

There's an awful lot of good to be found in the pages of this book. If only I hadn't been put off by how the tale was put together. I seem to be in the minority with my opinion, so keep in mind that your mileage may definitely vary.

The Paragon Hotel by Lyndsay Faye

ISBN: 9780735210752

G.P. Putnam's Sons © 2019

Hardcover, 432 pages

Historical Thriller, Standalone

Rating: C+

Source: Purchased from The Poisoned Pen.


 

At The Poisoned Pen with Lyndsay Faye!

I'd never read any of Lyndsay Faye's books, but that didn't keep Denis and me from slogging through crosstown rush hour traffic on a rainy Thursday evening to see her at The Poisoned Pen. By the time the event was over, I was more determined than ever to read the two of her books that I now own: The Paragon Hotel and Jane Steele.

The waiting time flew by because one of my Poisoned Pen pals was there, too. She's another Kathy, and I think we could be locked in a room together for a week and still find things to talk about afterward.

Barbara Peters (foreground left) interviewing Lyndsay Faye

Barbara: Thank you all for coming out on a very rainy evening to welcome back Lyndsay Faye. [audience cheers and applause] Lyndsay's The Paragon Hotel is our January historical mystery pick for a variety of reasons, and since we can never spend an hour talking about just the book's plot, I thought we would talk about some of the wonderful features of this book. Let's start with the cover, Lyndsay. I gather this wasn't the first cover for the book?

Lyndsay: It was not the first cover for this book! I love it. It's so pretty, right? One of the nicest comments about it was made by my editor who said how nice it would look next to Jane Steele.

Lyndsay Faye talking about her book cover

What initially happened with it-- and I hardly ever throw a fit about book covers but I did about this one-- was that they came back to me with a cover that had random African American people from 1940 on it who weren't even in the book... and this book is set in 1921. [audience laughter] So I threw a small fit.

Barbara: Good for you!

Lyndsay: I said absolutely not. These random people aren't even in the book, and I don't know what you're doing. I would like a different cover. And I think this one is gorgeous.

Barbara: It really is. Covers not only have to look beautiful in the bookstore, but they also have to look beautiful if you're looking at them on various websites. The other thing that I wanted to say is that it's very crisp. You can actually read it.

Lyndsay: It is very crisp, and I am so proud to say that this cover was the front page of BookPage this last week. I was very excited about that because it's never happened to me before. And it was realllllllllllllly... nerdy!

Barbara: That's all right. You can be an author nerd and a cover nerd. One of the things I thought was so interesting in reading various articles was your decision to write in the lingo of the times. It sounded like a fascinating thing to talk about.

Lyndsay: I'm so glad that you bring this up because you know how I think. A lot of authors talk about how the setting is also a character, so, for example, you have Holmes and Watson, but you also have London as a character. In my books, I think that English is this weird, not really mentioned character. Because all of my books have to deal with what do you sound like and how do you sound to other people.

Lyndsay Faye

With this particular book, I was determined to get 1921 slang right. It was so interesting because if you were to try to look up flapper slang, flapper slang is generally going to be something from 1926, 1927... Even the iconic "bee's knees" happened in 1923 so I couldn't use any of it. When I went to research it, it was very difficult for me to find the proper slang until I found a collection of all of Ernest Hemingway's war correspondence.

Hemingway was an ambulance driver during World War I. He wrote back to his family with unadulterated panache and plenty of slang. So I went through all of his war correspondence and made notes about the words he was using. For example, in 1921 you wouldn't say you want to do something, you would say that you admire to do it. I would never have known that if I hadn't come across Hemingway's letters. It was so fantastic because not only was I enjoying reading his letters, I was also learning about the slang. Those letters were a treasure trove.

Barbara: Glossary?

Lyndsay: You can actually figure out everything in this book without a glossary.

Barbara: Is it because you're an actress and you have all this experience in the theater that language is so important to you? In addition to being an author, that is.

Lyndsay: It was a really fun career for about ten years. The reason that I'm not an actor anymore-- I'll quote my friend Gary-- "Join the theater. Be an actor. And make literally hundreds of dollars!" And that is exactly what happens. [sympathetic laughter from audience] So I was very poor, and I was always working in restaurants at the same time. That got old eventually.

Lyndsay Faye

I think this is the right time to tell this story. My restaurant got knocked down by bulldozers so I had a six-month unemployment break. I told myself that I'd always wanted to finish this book I was writing, so I should just finish it. I had unemployment for six months, I should just do it.

So I did. And I sold it to Simon and Schuster. And it was really crazy! I never dreamed something like that would happen. But as an actor, I remember thinking that there was this book I wanted to read-- but it didn't exist. I decided to put up or shut up. If I wanted to read this book, I would have to write it.

As an actor, I do pay very close attention to the voice and the characters, and I do pay very very close attention to the slang. I'm trained to know how to do certain slang dialects. Probably about a dozen of them. Acting was such good training. I was never trained as a writer, but as an actor, I was trained as a storyteller. At the end of the day, I think that was very valuable.

Barbara: I thought as I was reading Jane Steele, and I certainly thought as I was reading this book that this is Lyndsay actually in character and writing from being in the character rather than writing from the outside as an author. There's an authenticity that comes from that. The way you tell the story has so much to do with the impact your story has on us. Did this story that takes place in Portland, Oregon in the 1920s and deals with the Ku Klux Klan really begin with a situation in your own life?

Lyndsay Faye

Lyndsay: It did. As all of you can tell, I am a Caucasian person, so that's not a surprise. I was born in San Jose, California. Very multicultural. My godmother is African American. My father had lost his job, and we had to move to a small town outside of Portland, Oregon. When I was about six years old, I remember asking my mother, "What happened to all the tan people?" because I didn't understand. My mother said, "I don't know, sweetheart. Honestly, I have no idea."

But the one that really stuck with me was when I attended Vacation Bible School. My parents were trying to fix the financial situation, and they thought that sending all of us to Vacation Bible School would give them the time they needed to do this.

I sat down in a church pew next to this little boy who was probably about six years old, too. Now, when I'm out in the sun, I get really really dark because on my mother's side of the family there is a trace of Native American blood-- specifically the Ute tribe-- and when I was born you couldn't distinguish between the pupil and the iris of my eyes. I looked like a devil baby. The little boy sitting next to me in the church pew looks at me and says, "Ewwww, I don't want to sit next to a Japanese girl!" This was just wrong on so many levels, but it's funny, too. One of all, I am not Japanese. Two of all, if I were Japanese, this would really suck. This is really not a cool place! And three of all, how dare you?!?

So part of the reason that I was driven to write this book is that-- even as a white person-- I still experienced racism in the Pacific Northwest. And that's batshit crazy.

Lyndsay Faye (R)

Barbara: I have to say that it was illuminating because we tend to think of the Klan and so much of what went on as being a Southern issue. Oregon hadn't really come across my radar as a place where racism was so rampant.

Lyndsay: Oregon is the only state to have written into their constitution that no black people and no mulatto people were allowed to live there. So it was illegal for people of color to live in Oregon. Their constitution was written in 1856, and they didn't change it until 1926-- so that it was no longer illegal for black people to live there. Here are some more deeply disturbing dates.

In 1870, black people were given the right to vote. Oregon was one of only five states-- the rest were southern states-- to refuse to ratify that amendment to the Constitution. They "quickly" saw the error of their ways and changed that in 1959. The year that the antiquated language in Oregon's constitution was removed was 2003. So... we're not really batting a thousand from Oregon regarding race and race relations.

Barbara: Did they treat the Native American population the same way?

Lyndsay: Yes. Absolutely. There was just terrible behavior toward any person of color. It didn't matter what color.

Barbara: So the Paragon Hotel is actually named for a real hotel...

Lyndsay: Yep!

Barbara: ... in Portland where people of color could stay.

Available Now!

Lyndsay: I really wanted to call the book by the hotel's real name, which was the Golden West Hotel, but if you put The Golden West Hotel on a book cover it looks as though you're writing a Western. Anything at all in this book that deals with the hotel is based on the Golden West Hotel. The Golden West Hotel was the only place for people of color to stay in Portland, Oregon because the book takes place five years before it was even legal for people of color to live there.

The Golden West Hotel was gorgeous. It had five different businesses on the ground floor. It had a candy store. It had a barber shop. It had a spa. It had all these things, including a speakeasy down in the basement. All the jazz singers, all the Pullman porters working the trains, black activists... any person who wasn't white... this was the only place they could stay in the entire city.

I just fell in love with the hotel and the whole idea of it. Writing a book about it was a privilege and an honor. I mean... what kind of balls, you know? It's illegal for us to live here, but we're going to open a hotel! They were amazing. The only reason why it's still not operating as a hotel is the Great Depression, but the building is still there. It's a community center.

Barbara: Nothing really began to shift until after World War II when we began to move toward desegregation. I was really surprised. My husband's great-grandfather, Julius Rosenwald, founded the Rosenwald Schools for black children in the South. His genius as a philanthropist was that, instead of just giving them money, he gave them seed money, and they had to come together as a community to use this seed money to build the schools. They were flourishing, and the educational value was terrific, but it took me years before I asked my husband, "If they were so great, why did they all close?" In 1956 when Brown vs the Board of Education desegregated the schools, you could no more have schools exclusively for blacks than you could have schools exclusively for whites.

Lyndsay Faye

You have a woman in your book, and what do we call her throughout the book...?

Lyndsay: Nobody!

Barbara: And she comes from Harlem in New York City...

Lyndsay: Yes, she does. I lived for nine years in Harlem, so I enjoyed setting part of the book there.

Nobody-- Alice James-- grew up with the Mafia, and she's trying to hide in plain sight. She's one of these people who grew up in a very dangerous situation, and she's just trying to slide into the wallpaper. Not be noticed. That skill winds up being very effective and very valuable when she's trying to escape from New York.

It was really interesting to write about her. I think a lot of us can relate to this sort of feeling: she decides that she's very frightened of many of the people around her but-- I can be anybody, so I am Nobody. I will be any person that I need to be just to get out of this.

Barbara: I liked how the porter took care of her on the train and that the reason why she wound up at the Paragon Hotel was that that was the only place he could take her. He certainly couldn't show up at any other hotel in town. I have to admit that I have a nostalgia for long train rides.

Lyndsay: I love trains! My editor knows this and always sets up the beginning of my book tours with a train ride to put me in the perfect mood.

One example of art at La Posada

Barbara: One night while Rob and I were eating at the Turquoise Room at La Posada in Winslow, I realized that the train that stops there is on its way to Chicago. Rob and I have to make several trips to and from Chicago now because we sold our press to a publisher there. I think it would be perfect to fly to Chicago and then come back on the train to Winslow!

Lyndsay: I agree!

After a short digression into how both women still dress up to travel by plane (even though everyone else seems to be in pajamas and yoga pants), we move along to Lyndsay's excitement.

Lyndsay: I've already apologized to Barbara for arriving in this state of total nonsense-- and not dressed-- because I had a really exciting day yesterday and an exciting day getting here. I'm super apologetic about it. You haven't heard the story yet, Barbara, have you?

Barbara: No, I haven't.

Lyndsay: Yesterday I was in Houston in a beautiful hotel called the Hotel ZaZa. I love it because I'm right there in the museum district. Right before I left to get on the plane, I had this perfume bottle-- one of the only fancy things I allow myself is perfume, I love really expensive perfume and I allow myself to get it once a year-- a bottle of 1876. The perfume bottle didn't break by the way. I love this perfume. I put it on, but I had moisturizer on my hands because I'd just gotten out of the shower. I dropped the perfume bottle. The perfume bottle landed on the glass sink in the precise spot for the sink to literally explode. I am not kidding. It exploded. I was bleeding from six places. I had to sign a medical waiver. So that's why I'm not dressed very well right now-- and I'm so sorry!

Barbara Peters (L) interviewing Lyndsay Faye

Barbara: How absolutely awful!

Lyndsay: Most of the bandaging is on my midriff and feet. My poor publicist was losing her mind. It was so bad for her, but I thought it was really interesting. [audience chuckles of disbelief]

They moved me into the most ridiculously luxurious suite at the Hotel ZaZa and asked me, "What do you want?" Literally. This was after the event at Murder By the Book; I was still bleeding, and I said, "I am kind of hungry." They put this menu in front of my face and said, "Anything." I looked at the menu. "A lobster roll would be delicious." They sent me a pile of lobster rolls! This mound of lobsters! 

Fan: What happened to the perfume?

Lyndsay: Nothing. It's in my bag!

[Audience cheers, applause, and laughter]

Barbara: So you can write a book called The Perfume Bomb with some authority...

Lyndsay: Yes, I can! But I do apologize to all of you for not wearing a cute dress! I was going to; it just didn't work out.

Barbara: No apology needed. It's a great story. Back to the book. I thought it was wonderful how, in a very few opening pages, very economically, you told us all about this person, move her across the country, and then put her in the place that you wanted to explore. Do you feel, this many books in, that that sort of thing comes more easily than way back when you were writing your first book?

Lyndsay: Thank you so much for asking that. Absolutely not! This is the hardest book I've ever written. I was pounding my head against the wall the entire time I was writing it. It was terrible.

Lyndsay Faye

Barbara: Was Jane Steele easier?

Lyndsay: Yes, absolutely, because Jane Steele is like some sort of weird fan fiction, and I was only researching one era. With this book, I had to research 1921 Portland, and then Harlem because I am really meticulous. I felt as though I were researching two books.

I had about 20,000 words written when I realized that I did not have a nuanced story. I've never thrown out a first draft before, and I chucked this one. I cried for days. I was on this writer's residency at Key West when I threw out that draft. They gave me a room for a month just to stay there and write. I felt so ugly and disappointed with myself. I was supposed to be there to write and all I had done was throw my writing away after only a week. 

My husband, Gabriel-- he's so sweet!-- said, "Look. That did happen to you, and it sucks. But how long would it have taken you at home with all of the distractions of our regular life to chuck that because you knew it wasn't working?" I told him, "You are so smart!"

Barbara: That was nice. Is that where you found the Hemingway letters or had you gone there because of the letters?

Lyndsay: No, I just happened to find them while I was there.

Barbara: So it all worked out.

Lyndsay: It all worked out brilliantly.

Lyndsay Faye (R)

Barbara: Would it have been as easy for you to realize the first draft wasn't working if it had been your first novel?

Lyndsay: Dust and Shadow? I love talking about my first novel. It's just about how crazy I am about Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. How much I love them as people. This is the book I wanted to read that didn't exist, so I wrote it.

Barbara: Let me ask you one last question. You did write if I remember correctly three books about a character, but now you seem to like writing individual stories. Are you more interested in writing standalones now?

Lyndsay: The reason why I stopped writing Timothy Wilde novels [The Gods of Gotham, Seven for a Secret, The Fatal Flame] is because they sold like turd sandwiches, so I was told I couldn't anymore. I didn't stop them on purpose, I stopped because no one was buying them. I was told to try something else, so I did. After I wrote Jane Steele, I tried going back to Timothy Wilde and had about 20,000 words done when they said that they needed me to write another book from another female perspective. "We need you to write another girl book."

Barbara: I wasn't taking a position one way or the other. I love series, and I like reading standalones. I don't think of them necessarily as standalones because you don't know when you write a book that there's not going to be more to say.

Lyndsay: As far as these standalones go, I am very happy to report that Jane Steele is being optioned into a film! That would be fun! [Sounds of appreciation from the audience]

After a short Q&A, it was time to adjourn to the signing line. I have a few books already lined up on my reading calendar, but I do know one thing: as soon as I can, I will be reading one of Lyndsay Faye's books!

I'll leave you with one last thought:

Have you entered my giveaway for an autographed copy of The Paragon Hotel? Time's running out!

January 2019 New Mystery Releases!

Here I am, compiling a new release post when I haven't even gone through all my reading statistics for the past year. I guess I can't get really enthused about doing that because I didn't meet my reading goal. I tend to be competitive, so I really don't like it when I fail. (Even though four eye surgeries may have had something to do with it.)

What I didn't stop doing was keeping an eye peeled (ouch) for new, enticing crime fiction that will be released throughout the month of January. If I ever stop doing that, you know something is seriously wrong!

These are my picks of the best in new crime fiction being released in January. I have them grouped according to release date, and the book covers and synopses are courtesy of Amazon. I hope I've listed some that tickle your fancy. Let's take a look!

=== January 8 ===

Title: Lives Laid Away

Author: Stephen Mack Jones

Series: #2 in the August Snow P.I. series set in Detroit, Michigan.

312 pages

*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books.

Synopsis: "When the body of an unidentified young Hispanic woman dressed as Queen Marie Antoinette is dredged from the Detroit River, the Detroit Police Department wants the case closed fast. Wayne County Coroner Bobby Falconi gives the woman’s photo to his old pal ex-police detective August Snow, insisting August show it around his native Mexicantown to see if anyone recognizes her. August’s good friend Elena, a prominent advocate for undocumented immigrants, recognizes the woman immediately as a local teenager, Isadora del Torres.

Izzy’s story is one the authorities don’t want getting around—and she’s not the only young woman to have disappeared during an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid, only to turn up dead a few weeks later. Preyed upon by the law itself, the people of Mexicantown have no one to turn to. August Snow, the son of an African-American cop and a Mexican-American painter, will not sit by and watch his neighbors suffer in silence. In a guns-blazing wild ride across Detroit, from its neo-Nazi biker hole-ups to its hip-hop recording studios, its swanky social clubs to its seedy nightclubs, August puts his own life on the line to protect the community he loves." 

Title: The Burglar

Author: Thomas Perry

Standalone thriller set in Los Angeles.

304 pages

*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books.

Synopsis: "Elle Stowell is a young woman with an unconventional profession: burglary. But Elle is no petty thief―with just the right combination of smarts, looks, and skills, she can easily stroll through ritzy Bel Air neighborhoods and pick out the perfect home for plucking the most valuable items. This is how Elle has always gotten by―she is good at it, and she thrives on the thrill. But after stumbling upon a grisly triple homicide while stealing from the home of a wealthy art dealer, Elle discovers that she is no longer the only one sneaking around. Somebody is searching for her.


As Elle realizes that her knowledge of the high-profile murder has made her a target, she races to solve the case before becoming the next casualty, using her breaking-and-entering skills to uncover the truth about exactly who the victims were and why someone might have wanted them dead. With high-stakes action and shocking revelations, The Burglar will keep readers on the edge of their seats as they barrel towards the heart-racing conclusion."

Title: Sydney Noir

Edited by John Dale

A collection of crime fiction short stories set in Sydney, Australia.

256 pages

Synopsis: "Sydney is a good choice for Akashic's first noir anthology set in Australia...The 14 uniformly strong selections feature familiar subgenre figures: gangsters, ethically compromised cops, and people bent on revenge for the loss of a loved one...Fans of dark crime fiction will want to seek out other works by these contributors, most of whom will be unfamiliar to American readers."

Title: The Paragon Hotel

Author: Lyndsay Faye

Standalone historical thriller set on a cross-country train bound for Portland, Oregon.

432 pages

Synopsis: "The year is 1921, and "Nobody" Alice James is on a cross-country train, carrying a bullet wound and fleeing for her life following an illicit drug and liquor deal gone horribly wrong. Desperate to get as far away as possible from New York City and those who want her dead, she has her sights set on Oregon: a distant frontier that seems the end of the line.

She befriends Max, a black Pullman porter who reminds her achingly of Harlem, who leads Alice to the Paragon Hotel upon arrival in Portland. Her unlikely sanctuary turns out to be the only all-black hotel in the city, and its lodgers seem unduly terrified of a white woman on the premises. But as she meets the churlish Dr. Pendleton, the stately Mavereen, and the unforgettable club chanteuse Blossom Fontaine, she begins to understand the reason for their dread. The Ku Klux Klan has arrived in Portland in fearful numbers--burning crosses, inciting violence, electing officials, and brutalizing blacks. And only Alice, along with her new "family" of Paragon residents, are willing to search for a missing mulatto child who has mysteriously vanished into the Oregon woods.

Why was "Nobody" Alice James forced to escape Harlem? Why do the Paragon's denizens live in fear--and what other sins are they hiding? Where did the orphaned child who went missing from the hotel, Davy Lee, come from in the first place? And, perhaps most important, why does Blossom Fontaine seem to be at the very center of this tangled web?"

Title: The New Iberia Blues

Author: James Lee Burke

Series: #22 in the Dave Robicheaux police procedural series set in Louisiana.

464 pages

Synopsis: "Detective Dave Robicheaux’s world isn’t filled with too many happy stories, but Desmond Cormier’s rags-to-riches tale is certainly one of them. Robicheaux first met Cormier on the streets of New Orleans, when the young, undersized boy had foolish dreams of becoming a Hollywood director.

Twenty-five years later, when Robicheaux knocks on Cormier’s door, it isn’t to congratulate him on his Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations. Robicheaux has discovered the body of a young woman who’s been crucified, wearing only a small chain on her ankle. She disappeared near Cormier’s Cyrpemort Point estate, and Robicheaux, along with young deputy, Sean McClain, are looking for answers. Neither Cormier nor his enigmatic actor friend Antoine Butterworth are saying much, but Robicheaux knows better.

As always, Clete Purcel and Davie’s daughter, Alafair, have Robicheaux’s back. Clete witnesses the escape of Texas inmate, Hugo Tillinger, who may hold the key to Robicheaux’s case. As they wade further into the investigation, they end up in the crosshairs of the mob, the deranged Chester Wimple, and the dark ghosts Robicheaux has been running from for years. Ultimately, it’s up to Robicheaux to stop them all, but he’ll have to summon a light he’s never seen or felt to save himself and those he loves.

Stephen King hailed New York Times bestselling author James Lee Burke “as good as he ever was.” Now, with The New Iberia Blues, Burke proves that he “remains the heavyweight champ, a great American novelist whose work, taken individually or as a whole, is unsurpassed” (Michael Connelly)."

Title: She Lies in Wait

Author: Gytha Lodge

Series: #1 in the DCI Jonah Sheens police procedural series set in England.

368 pages

Synopsis: "On a scorching July night in 1983, a group of teenagers goes camping in the forest. Bright and brilliant, they are destined for great things, and the youngest of the group—Aurora Jackson—is delighted to be allowed to tag along. The evening starts like any other—they drink, they dance, they fight, they kiss. Some of them slip off into the woods in pairs, others are left jealous and heartbroken. But by morning, Aurora has disappeared. Her friends claim that she was safe the last time they saw her, right before she went to sleep. An exhaustive investigation is launched, but no trace of the teenager is ever found.

Thirty years later, Aurora’s body is unearthed in a hideaway that only the six friends knew about, and Jonah Sheens is put in charge of solving the long-cold case. Back in 1983, as a young cop in their small town, he had known the teenagers—including Aurora—personally, even before taking part in the search. Now he’s determined to finally get to the truth of what happened that night. Sheens’s investigation brings the members of the camping party back to the forest, where they will be confronted once again with the events that left one of them dead, and all of them profoundly changed forever."

=== January 22 ===

Title: Rupture

Author: Ragnar Jónasson

Series: #4 in the Dark Iceland police procedural series set in northern Iceland.

272 pages

Synopsis: "Hailed for combining the darkness of Nordic Noir with classic mystery writing, author Ragnar Jonasson’s books are haunting, atmospheric, and complex. Rupture, the latest Ari Thór thriller, delivers another dark mystery that is chillingly stunning with its complexity and fluidity.

Young policeman Ari Thór tries to solve a 50-year-old murder when new evidence surfaces. But the case proves difficult in a town where no one wants to know the truth, where secrets are a way of life. He's assisted by Ísrún, a news reporter in Reykjavik who is investigating an increasingly chilling case of her own. Things take a sinister turn when a child goes missing in broad daylight. With a stalker on the loose and the town in quarantine, the past might just come back to haunt them." 

Title: The Golden Tresses of the Dead 

Author: Alan Bradley

Series: #10 in the Flavia de Luce historical series set in England.

352 pages

Synopsis: "Although it is autumn in the small English town of Bishop’s Lacey, the chapel is decked with exotic flowers. Yes, Flavia de Luce’s sister Ophelia is at last getting hitched, like a mule to a wagon. “A church is a wonderful place for a wedding,” muses Flavia, “surrounded as it is by the legions of the dead, whose listening bones bear silent witness to every promise made at the altar.” Flavia is not your normal twelve-year-old girl. An expert in the chemical nature of poisons, she has solved many mysteries, sharpening her considerable detection skills to the point where she had little choice but to turn professional. So Flavia and dependable Dogger, estate gardener and sounding board extraordinaire, set up shop at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, eager to serve—not so simple an endeavor with her odious little moon-faced cousin, Undine, constantly underfoot. But Flavia and Dogger persevere. Little does she know that their first case will be extremely close to home, beginning with an unwelcome discovery in Ophelia’s wedding cake: a human finger."

Title: The Smiling Man

Author: Joseph Knox

Series: #2 in the Aiden Waits police procedural series set in England.

400 pages

Synopsis: "Aidan Waits is back on the night shift, the Manchester PD dumping ground for those too screwed-up for more glamorous work. But the monotony of petty crimes and lonesome nights is shattered when he and his partner are called to investigate a break-in The Palace, an immense, empty hotel in the center of the city.

There they find the body of a man. He is dead. The tags have been cut from his clothes, his teeth have been filed down, and even his fingertips have been replaced…
And he is smiling.

But as Waits begins to unravel the mystery of the smiling man, he becomes a target. Someone wants very badly to make this case disappear, and as their threats escalate, Aidan realizes that the answers may lie not only with the wealthy families and organized criminals connected to the Palace but with a far greater evil from his own past."

=== January 29 ===

Title: The Gun Also Rises

Author: Sherry Harris

Series: #6 in the Garage Sale cozy series set in Massachusetts.

288 pages

*Upcoming review on Kittling: Books.

Synopsis: "A wealthy widow has asked Sarah Winston to sell her massive collection of mysteries through her garage sale business. While sorting through piles of books stashed in the woman's attic, Sarah is amazed to discover a case of lost Hemingway stories, stolen from a train in Paris back in 1922. How did they end up in Belle Winthrop Granville's attic in Ellington, Massachusetts, almost one hundred years later?
 

Before Sarah can get any answers, Belle is assaulted, the case is stolen, a maid is killed, and Sarah herself is dodging bullets. And when rumors spread that Belle has a limited edition of The Sun Also Rises in her house, Sarah is soon mixed up with a mobster, the fanatical League of Literary Treasure Hunters, and a hard-to-read rare book dealer. With someone willing to kill for the Hemingway, Sarah has to race to catch the culprit—or the bell may toll for her . . ."

Title: Death by Chocolate Malted Milkshake

Author: Sarah Graves

Series: #2 in the Death by Chocolate cozy series set in Maine.

240 pages

Synopsis: "This summer, Eastport’s favorite lovebirds, kindergarten teacher Sharon Sweetwater and Coast Guard Captain Andy Devine, are getting married. The gala reception is sure to be the fête of the season, especially with a wedding-cake-sized whoopie pie courtesy of The Chocolate Moose. For Jake and Ellie, the custom-ordered confection will finally reel in some much-needed profits. But the celebratory air and sweet smell of success are ruined by foul murder.

When Sharon’s bitter ex-boyfriend Toby is poisoned with an arsenic-laced milkshake, Andy is jailed as the prime suspect and the wedding is canceled, whoopie pie and all. Then Sharon makes a shocking confession—one that sounds like a fishy attempt to get Andy off the hook. Now both the bride and groom are behind bars. And with the fate of The Chocolate Moose at stake, it’s up to Jake and Ellie to catch a poisonous predator before someone else sips their last dessert."

Title: Death by Committee

Author: Alexis Morgan

Series: #1 in the Abby McCree cozy series set in Snowberry Creek.

304 pages

Synopsis: "After a rough divorce, Abby McCree only wants to stitch up her life and move on. But other loose ends appear after her elderly Aunt Sybil passes away, leaving Abby to tend to a rundown estate, complete with a slobbery Mastiff of questionable pedigree and a sexy tenant who growls more than the dog. As Abby gets drawn into a tight-knit quilting guild, she makes a twisted discovery—Aunt Sybil’s only known rival is buried in her backyard!

Despite what local detectives say, Abby refuses to accept that her beloved aunt had anything to do with the murder. While navigating a busy social calendar and rediscovering the art of quilting, she launches an investigation of her own to clear Aunt Sybil’s name and catch the true culprit. The incriminating clues roll in, yet Abby can’t help but wonder—can she survive her new responsibilities in Snowberry Creek and still manage to patch together a killer’s deadly pattern without becoming the next victim?"

How did I do? Did any of my choices make it onto your own wishlists? Which ones? (You know inquiring minds would love to know!) I have to admit that I'm most looking forward to Ragnar Jónasson's Rupture; I've become quite a fan of his writing!

Happy New Year, and Happy Reading!