Book Review

The fascinating story of Lyudmila Pavlichenko

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By Ande Jacobson

The Diamond Eye is Kate Quinn’s largely biographical novel chronicling the story of Lyudmila Pavlichenko, a woman who made a huge contribution to defeating Hitler’s assault on her homeland during WWII. Pavlichenko was a Ukrainian born Russian woman who became a deadly sniper in the Red Army in the early days of the war. Her story shows that while there’s a certain amount of luck in surviving the horrific conditions she endured, her skills and determination were invaluable in her efforts. While Quinn is famous for writing historical fiction, weaving gripping stories surrounding historic times or events, this novel is drawn more directly from an original source than most. Her primary reference for the novel was Pavlichenko’s autobiography, Lady Death: The Memoirs of Stalin’s Sniper. She used an English translation by David Foreman as a central part of her research beyond various official records to which she had access. As such, almost all of the characters are from real life in this story, although one major character is a composite of two real men. Quinn also used a bit of poetic license with respect to Pavlichenko’s autobiography, at times reordering some events to create a more cohesive storyline and filling in some gaps in the timeline. It’s likely that some of the events in the source material were themselves smoothed and brightened given the work was approved by the Soviet Union and thus was potentially at least partially propaganda. On the other hand, the official record of various events is clear and independently verifies much of the material. Continue reading →

The kids will be OK

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By Ande Jacobson

Last to Die, is the tenth book in Tess Gerritsen’s Rizzoli & Isles series and was first released in 2012. Like the previous book, the Kindle version of this one includes a bonus short story in the Rizzoli & Isles canon entitled John Doe also from 2012. For the main story, Gerritsen weaves a complicated web of unlikely connections that build to a surprising conclusion. The focus is on three unfortunate children, Teddy Clock, Claire Ward, and Will Yablonski. The first part of the book gives some background on all three, and they have a strange connection in that they not only lost their families in tragic accidents, they lost the families that took them in afterwards in equally horrific fashion. The three seemingly had no connection to one another other than being their family’s last survivors. Through a series of unlikely events, they all end up at the Evensong School in an effort to keep them safe while the authorities investigate what happened to their families. Before meeting at the school, the three didn’t think they had ever met and didn’t think they had anything in common, at least at first. Julian Perkins also plays a major role in this story, and he and Dr. Maura Isles help one another with the investigation. Anthony Sansone also joins the fray in an important but peripheral capacity. Of course the police regulars including Jane Rizzoli, Barry Frost, Darren Crowe, Lieutenant Marquette, and others are prominent in the story as well. Continue reading →

When myth and reality merges

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By Ande Jacobson

The Silent Girl, is the ninth book in Tess Gerritsen’s Rizzoli & Isles series, first released in 2011. This book is a treat in that the Kindle version also includes a bonus short story in the Rizzoli & Isles canon entitled Freaks from 2010. Gerritsen considers The Silent Girl a very personal story in which she ties in ancient Chinese folklore that her mother had related to her. Her mother learned these fables and legends during her childhood in China, and they add an ethereal element to the story that infuses the mythos into Jane Rizzoli’s world in unexpected ways. As often happens in Gerritsen’s books, she starts in the past giving readers a foundation they don’t realize connects until much later in the story. This time, although the story starts in San Francisco in the past, it quickly returns to Boston in the present where Maura Isles is testifying in court. Maura’s background matches that of the author to a point – both author and protagonist majored in Anthropology as undergraduates at Stanford and attended medical school at UC San Francisco. From there they diverge in specialty and position, but that’s merely background. The trial in the story sets the scene for why Maura is at odds with most of Boston PD for much of this story. Her factual testimony is key in convicting a police officer accused of killing a young man while in custody. Although the court case has nothing to do with the crimes being investigated in the bulk of the story, it makes the connection between Maura and Jane all the more poignant despite the growing rift caused by Maura’s crossing the thin blue line through her court testimony. Continue reading →

Ski trips can be dangerous

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By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s eighth book in the Rizzoli & Isles series, Ice Cold, was first released in 2010. This time Gerritsen doesn’t dig into her anthropology background. Instead she uses her medical background on the living rather than the dead in this heart-stopping adventure. Reeling from her recent breakup with Father Daniel Brophy, Dr. Maura Isles attends a pathology conference in Wyoming of all places. In November. Before readers catch up with Maura’s adventure, they are first introduced to an insular community in Plain of Angels, Idaho. The compound is home to a small, religious group serving their leader, Prophet Jeremiah Goode. As is often the case in Gerritsen’s mysteries, this opening chapter from the past provides key pieces of information that will become crucial later in the story. In this look back, readers see that the prophet leads what can only be described as a cult. While the activities might jolt the hairs on the back of a reader’s neck, no specific crime is yet revealed. Continue reading →

The things we keep

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By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s seventh Rizzoli & Isles book, The Keepsake, was first released in 2008. Gerritsen digs even further into her anthropology background branching off into the sub-specialties of Archeology and Egyptology when a mummy discovered at a local museum turns out to be not at all what it seems. As always in this series the past predicts the future, although in this perplexing case, far more secrets than usual are uncovered. The story begins with a quote from Dr. Jonathan Elias, Egyptologist:

“Every mummy is an exploration, an undiscovered continent that you’re visiting for the very first time.”

Continue reading →

Is evil born or made?

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By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s sixth Rizzoli & Isles book, The Mephisto Club, was first released in 2006. This time, Gerritsen uses her Stanford undergraduate degree in anthropology to explore ancient myths through texts predating the major monotheistic religious artifacts and scriptures. This book is a dark story, but the academic exploration is fascinating. The investigators cross paths with an eccentric group of sleuths with an international presence who happen to be co-located at the site of a gruesome murder. As is often the case in this series, Gerritsen weaves seemingly disconnected threads together, introducing readers to key characters before the events of the investigation take place. Continue reading →

The hidden and the hiding

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By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s fifth Rizzoli & Isles book, Vanish, was first released in 2005. Like the previous books in the series, this one follows seemingly separate storylines that intersect in disturbing ways, this time tackling human trafficking and abuses by the powerful.

Gerritsen jumps into the first arc of the main story without a prologue. The story opens in the past in Mexico narrated by Mila. Mila is a young Russian immigrant who thought she was going to a land of opportunity, but instead she finds herself in a nightmare. She’s trapped with several other young women in the desert in Mexico traveling north to the U.S. What she doesn’t know until she gets there is that she and her companions will be forced into a type of slavery that is far too common. Continue reading →

Double take

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By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s fourth Rizzoli & Isles book, Body Double, came out in 2004. Like each previous book, we learn more of the main characters’ back story, this time that of Maura Isles. Readers already knew some of the basics from previous books including the fact that she was adopted, her history before moving to Boston, the fact that she was married, but they didn’t know much about how and why she’d been adopted or anything at all about her birth mother. This book changes all of that in a vivid and sometimes terrifying way. The story’s prologue starts out sweet, in the past, but it quickly turns into a nightmare that seems disconnected from the present until the pieces start coming together. In the present, there’s a murder of course, but this time there’s also a fair amount of misdirection from the start. Continue reading →

‘A Firehose of Falsehood’ is a must read!

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By Ande Jacobson

A brilliant new book entitled A Firehose of Falsehood: The Story of Disinformation written by Teri Kanefield and illustrated by Pat Dorian is finally available to all (as of 13 February 2024). You can buy your copy at your favorite brick and mortar bookseller, order it online, or borrow it from your local library. In August 2023, I had the opportunity to review a pre-publication copy of this stunning work, and it packed a punch. I more recently received a pre-publication hardcover copy of the book which I was eager to see. Although it was the same material as the digital version I previously reviewed, it was even more gripping in hardcover. This is a must-read book for everyone. A Firehose of Falsehood is a graphic novel, and as such, the illustrations are an integral and powerful part of the story. Kanefield wrote the informative and entertaining prose, and Dorian’s breathtaking four-color illustrations make this book also a work of art. Continue reading →

The dangers behind the walls

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By Ande Jacobson

Keeping on her yearly schedule, Tess Gerritsen’s third book in the Rizzoli & Isles series, The Sinner, first appeared in August 2003. Gerritsen goes in a new direction this time digging deeper in the personal lives of Detective Jane Rizzoli and Dr. Maura Isles. Maura’s ex-husband, Victor Banks, is also a doctor though not a medical examiner. Victor features prominently in this story, and their complicated history intrudes on Maura’s work this time. Of course there are murders to solve, the first one of a nun killed in Graystones Abbey, the home of a sequestered order. Two nuns were attacked, one died at the scene, the other was taken to the hospital, but the story doesn’t end there. There are some other seemingly disconnected murders across a surprisingly wide region. The story has tentacles that reach across states and across the world in surprising ways. Gerritsen is masterful in her storytelling, interweaving the professional and personal lives of her characters, and as always the details matter. Continue reading →