Author: A Good Reed Review

The hidden threat may be worse than the known threat

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By Ande Jacobson

The Grey Wolf is the nineteenth mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Gamache series. This one is a little different than some earlier in the series in that it’s really part one of a two-part story that completes in The Black Wolf. That’s not to say that the story isn’t a complete one on its own because it is, but the hook into the next book after the current case is resolved is more direct than Penny usually provides. Armand Gamache leads his Sûreté du Québec Homicide division team on a case that poses an immediate threat of monstrous proportions. The bigger problem for Armand is that he doesn’t know who he can trust, so he keeps the details tight only known to a very small, fully trusted cadre of himself, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, and Isabelle Lacoste, i.e., he and his co-deputies. As often happens with Armand, he’s approached by someone with a secret that isn’t fully shared, but peaks his interest. Before the source, a young biologist with a history of drug use, can fully share, he’s killed by a car right in front of Armand almost taking Armand with him. The case then gets even more frustrating and urgent bringing back some contacts from the past including the Abbot from the remote monastery, Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups. There are also some unexpected relationships that are slowly revealed. Continue reading →

Is evil born or nurtured?

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By Ande Jacobson

A World of Curiosities is the eighteenth mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Gamache series. Armand Gamache, his wife Reine-Marie, their children, grandchildren, Armand’s godfather Stephen Horowitz, his second-in-command and son-in-law Jean-Guy Beauvoir, and the rest of the Three Pines regulars are back. Armand has his hands full this time with old and new murders sending his Sûreté du Québec Homicide division on the trail again. There is a good bit of history in this installment, both Canadian history as well as Armand and Jean-Guy’s personal history, specifically the case that first brought them together in this life. That history concerns not only their relationship but also bears heavily on the current cases at hand. An old nemesis also returns for a disturbing confrontation that strikes deeply and disrupts Armand’s internal fortitude. Forgiveness, human nature, and revenge all come into play as the plot thickens. Continue reading →

Should we have a right or a duty to die?

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By Ande Jacobson

The Madness of Crowds is the seventeenth mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Gamache series. Armand Gamache, his wife Reine-Marie, and their children, grandchildren, and Armand’s godfather, Stephen Horowitz are all back in Three Pines. Armand is hard at work as the Chief Inspector of the Homicide division at the Sûreté du Québec, and his son-in-law, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, is his co-second as he readjusts to being back in the thick of things. This time, Penny tackles an extremely controversial subject coming out of the pandemic, the subject of euthanasia, but from an unexpected direction. At the end of the previous installment, Annie and Jean-Guy welcomed their second child into the world, a daughter they named Idola. Theirs was an informed choice to complete the pregnancy even though they found out early on that their child had Down Syndrome. They could have aborted the fetus, but instead chose to bring their daughter into the world, to love her, to care for her, and give her the best life they possibly could. Dark forces are amassing though, and their world is rocked by controversy. In the story, a famed statistics professor, Abigail Robinson, had recently released a report from the pandemic that suggested that resources were limited, and that it would be better for society if people who were old or infirm weren’t necessarily given life extending treatments and were instead allowed to die. More to the point, that for the good of society, she posited that they essentially had a duty to die. That of course hits very close to home for Armand and company, and especially for Jean-Guy and Annie. Continue reading →

Armand is always an investigator

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By Ande Jacobson

All the Devils Are Here is the sixteenth mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Gamache series. It starts out serving as a break from the usual Three Pines/Québec storylines moving instead to Paris, France. Armand Gamache and his wife Reine-Marie are taking a short vacation from his heading the Homicide division at the Sûreté du Québec visiting their children and grandchildren. Their daughter, Annie, and son-in-law, Jean-Guy Beauvoir are soon expecting the birth of their second child. Jean-Guy has recently started his job in the private sector after leaving the Sûreté. Unfortunately for Armand and Reine-Marie, Jean-Guy’s new job is in Paris, so both of their children and all of their grandchildren are across the pond. At least it gives them a nice place to visit for important occasions. Continue reading →

What would Armand Gamache do?

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By Ande Jacobson

A Better Man is the fifteenth mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Gamache series. This time Armand Gamache is back at the Sûreté du Québec in his old job as the Chief Inspector of the Homicide division, a job he temporarily shares with his former second-in-command (and son-in-law) Jean-Guy Beauvoir. He’s made a lot of enemies both in the Sûreté leadership and in the government, although he also has a few well-placed friends. He’s being attacked by the press, by social media, and while it would be far easier for him to just retire after all of the turmoil he’s endured, his sense of duty and honor will not let him do that. To make matters worse, the province is facing a spring catastrophe that brings with it both bad press and life-threatening danger. In all of this, Armand is pulled into a search that quickly becomes a murder investigation that tugs at him personally. It’s not that he’s well-acquainted with the victim, but he is emotionally torn by those surrounding her including her distraught father, an abusive husband, and circumstances that are murky at best. Continue reading →

Comfortable in our own skin

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By Ande Jacobson

Everyone should be able to be comfortable in their own skin. They shouldn’t have to justify who they are. They should just be able to be. They should be free to live their life without fear because of who they are, or what they look like. As I’ve written many times before, humans, all of us, are a single species. We all have the same basic needs for clean air, safe food and water, shelter, clothing, companionship, and in the modern world, transportation, education, health care, and so much more. Today in the U.S., we have a federal government working hard to turn us against one another. It is working to make us hate one another for myriad superficial reasons. It is working to make us afraid to leave our homes, to express our views, and in far too many cases, to even exist. It is pulling at visceral emotions to make us fear one another when we should instead be supporting each other. Continue reading →

Confessions may sometimes mislead

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By Ande Jacobson

Confession is the third book in Michael Cordell’s Contempt series, and it’s a page-turner. Released at the beginning of August 2025, readers again join Thane Banning on a controversial case. Thane is a criminal attorney with a past. Having been framed and imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit, he’s still struggling since his release to cope with what that did to him. He’s taken on some difficult cases in the past and won even when the odds were against him, although his methods weren’t always quite by the book. He’s trying desperately to change that though not just for himself, but for his wife Hannah, and their as yet unborn child. He wants to get back to being the man he was before his confinement. This time, Thane takes on a client who is accused of killing a popular football coach with a winning record at a notable local university. The biggest problem is that she confessed to the crime, so Thane and his team are starting from a huge disadvantage. Thane’s team includes:

  • Kristin Peterson – a new, young attorney who is learning the ropes and has an eye toward righting wrongs.
  • Gideon Spence – originally a friend from Thane’s time in prison who is now part enforcer, part private investigator, and all parts loyal friend.
  • Letitia – receptionist and office manager extraordinaire.

Continue reading →

The line between guests and residents can be a fractious one

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By Ande Jacobson

The second book in Tess Gerritsen’s Martini Club series, The Summer Guests, again returns to Purity, Maine. Maggie Bird, Declan Rose, Ben Diamond, and Ingrid and Lloyd Slocum are again involved in solving not just one crime, but also an old one that took place decades ago in the secluded hamlet they now call home. The five members of the Martini Club are ex-CIA operatives who were just looking for a quiet retirement, but while spies can leave active duty, they can’t turn off their zest for solving the puzzles that come their way. This time, Maggie rounds up the club when her friend and neighbor, Luther Yount, is arrested for something he didn’t do. Continue reading →

Gerrymandering is cheating

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By Ande Jacobson

Gerrymandering is a practice that has a long history in the U.S., and no matter who’s doing it, it’s cheating by taking away the voices of the electorate and predetermining an outcome based on partisanship. In practice, it’s done by drawing electoral district boundaries to serve the party doing the drawing by silencing the voices of any opposition through packing or cracking any voting blocks in the party’s favor. Packing entails grouping large blocks of opposition voters together even if they wouldn’t normally be in single district to limit how many districts they can control. Cracking entails breaking up opposition party blocks across districts and separating them further to dilute their votes. In short, gerrymandering is a method of voter suppression and election fraud that’s unfortunately legal but completely unethical. While electoral districts should be effectively a grid based on population density, instead, gerrymandered districts tend to resemble abstract art. Both major parties have engaged in various levels of the practice over the years, and it stems from serious corruption and an inability to compete fairly in an election. Continue reading →

“Speak English” will change perceptions

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By Ande Jacobson

The San Francisco Fringe Festival 2025 is sponsored by the EXIT Theatre and runs at the Taylor Street Theatre on weekends from Friday, 8 August – Sunday, 24 August 2025 offering performances that break new ground across multiple disciplines. Some are fairly standard theatrical faire, while others are more performance art stretching the imagination and perception. One latter-type offering mixes the fiber arts with movement and other theatrical devices to reach audiences on an emotional and sensory level challenging basic assumptions about fiction/non-fiction, narrative/non-narrative, sense/non-sense, and even basic meaning as we understand it. Speak English, conceived and presented by Vanessa Kamp, encourages audiences to come to their own conclusions through a solo performance highlighting nuance, color, pageantry, sound, and emotion with very little verbal exposition. In fact, less than five minutes out of the 60 minute performance are spoken at all, yet the characters Kamp brings to life speak volumes through other means. As such, the title comes from a place of awareness attempting to break barriers and preconceived notions, in this case stemming from one of the characters and scenes in the performance. Continue reading →