A good friend (shout-out to Laurie!) recommended Georgia Hunter's One Good Thing, loaned me a copy, and told me it was about a Jewish woman during World War II. I cringed internally because I've read a lot of WW II books and women in danger. I read it for my friend. It was amazing. All of the books I've read have focused on Germany, the US, Poland, England, China, or Japan. This is the first book I've read about the war in Italy. I gained an understanding of the complex situation that Italy and its people found themselves in. The Jewish population, under Mussolini, faced persecution, imprisonment, and death on the same scale as Jews in Germany. Hitler and Mussolini were allies for a reason. The novel centers around Lili, a Jewish Italian woman. She finds it difficult to believe her beloved country would treat its citizens with such cruelty. Her story arc demonstrates how war changes people, exposing them. Some are brave and sacrificial or greedy and destructive, and some are both. Hunter realizes that there is a spectrum of responses. She has done terrific research, and her descriptions of food, terrain, and culture feel authentic. I recommend it as well!
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Fyre by Angie Sage is the final book in the Septimus Heap series. Sage lands the series well. Each of the major characters has a credible story arc that shows how they've grown and gives glimpses of who they will become. The threads of plot she has scattered throughout the book are woven together to a satisfying finish. Mysteries are solved, wrongs are righted, dangers are bravely met, and friendships endure. Her target audience is middle grade, but I, for whom middle grade was still called junior high, enjoyed them. Sage writes compelling plots, engaging characters, and sly humor.
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This has been a week for reading friend recommendations. I had heard of C. J. Box, but hadn't read anything by him until now. Open Season is a mystery novel, with Joe Pickett, the new game warden in Twelve Sleeps, Wyoming, as the mystery solver. Just about everyone hunts in this area, but all game wardens are as incorruptible as Joe. Being honest and upright doesn't make him any friends and earns him some antagonists. One of those antagonists comes to Joe's backyard to die by his woodpile. Joe wants to know why, but everyone is in a hurry to close the case. Unsurprisingly, Joe can't let it go, unknowingly putting himself and his family in danger. Every place has its own complications and problems. Box skillful makes the Mountain West a character in this well-paced, tense mystery. I suspect I will be reading more of C. J. Box.
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