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Amy Bishop-Ryan
American Dirt
by Jeanine Cummins
Flatiron Books (2020)
Lydia Quixano Pérez lives in the Mexican city of Acapulco. She runs a bookstore. She has a son, Luca, the love of her life, and a wonderful husband who is a journalist. When Lydia’s husband publishes a tell-all profile of Javier, the head of the newest drug cartel that has gruesomely taken over the city, none of their lives will ever be the same.
Forced to flee, Lydia and eight-year-old Luca soon find themselves miles and worlds away from their comfortable middle-class existence. Instantly transformed into migrants, Lydia and Luca join the countless people trying to reach el norte. Lydia soon sees that everyone is running from something, but what exactly are they running to?
Joanne Viola
A Most Beautiful Thing
by Arshay Cooper
Flatiron Books (2020)
This book is an uplifting true story of a group of young men growing up on Chicago’s West side, who formed the first all-black high school rowing team in this country. In the late 1990’s, Arshay Cooper experienced the harder side of life. Living in a one room apartment with his recovering addict mother and three siblings, they were surrounded by gangs and drugs in the hallways and on the streets below.
Responding to a school poster, which read, “Join the Crew Team”, Arshay and several classmates signed up, not knowing what they signed up for. Some had never been in water. Adversity faced them at every turn, but this brave band of brothers formed a family that forever changed the sport of crew and their lives.
This sports memoir is now a documentary narrated by actor and hip-hop artist Common.
Patty O’Brien
The Night Hawk
by Elly Griffiths
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (2021)
This is the newest book in the Ruth Galloway Mystery series (Book #13), featuring forensic archeologist Dr. Ruth Galloway, and DCI Nelson, along with other previous series characters, and new players, including a group of amateur archeologists who stumble upon Bronze Age artifacts along with a dead body, or two, or three.
Although the common threads of theme and characters link each book in the series, each book can stand alone without having to start the series with book #1, The Crossing Place (2009).
Janice Henshaw
The Secrets of Midwives
by Sally Hepworth
St. Martin’s Press (2015)
This is a wonderful story of three generations of midwives and the secrets they keep that push them apart, but ultimately bind them together. This is a page-turning novel with plot twists that explore life, love, and loss.
David Henshaw
The Way of All Flesh
by Ambrose Parry
Cannongate Books (2018)
Written by husband-and-wife Chris Brookmyre (crime novelist) and Dr. Marisa Haetzman (consultant anesthetist) under the pseudonym Ambrose Parry, this historical crime novel is set in 1840’s Edinburgh where young women are being discovered dead across the Old Town. The story focuses on the efforts of an anesthetist’s assistant and a housemaid as they team up to uncover who’s responsible for these gruesome deeds.
