The Night Season by Chelsea Cain

Chelsea Cain's latest entry, her fourth, in the Archie Sheridan detective series does not disappoint. With serial killer Gretchen Lowell behind bars once again, Archie has slowly begun the physical and emotional healing process, and is back on the job at the Portland, Oregon Police Department with reporter Susan Ward at his side.

The city is undergoing the worst flooding it has seen in decades, and several people have drowned as a result - until the medical examiner discovers that the deaths were actually the result of a mysterious toxin only found in a rare type of octupus. The authorities are baffled by the clues they have to work with, until even one of their own falls victim to the serial toxin.

As Archie and his team tirelessly follow any and all leads, they are in a race against time as Portland's flooded streets become more and more dangerous and their colleague struggles to hang on. Will they be able to locate the source of the poisonous octopus and stop the killer before he strikes again? Will Susan piece together the historical clues from the vanished community of Vanport, washed away 50 years earlier in an earlier flood?

Chelsea Cain does a marvelous job in her first book where Gretchen Lowell is not a major player - she nicely ties in the historical back story with the contemporary crises. As always, her books are so well written, she keeps the action humming right along, and in this case, two mysteries are solved by the end of the book while the friendship between Archie and Susan deepens.

March Books Into Movies

This month sees a plethora of movies being released that are based on literary works. Here is a taste of what to expect - just remember the old adage, "Never judge a book by its movie!"

"The Adjustment Bureau" starring Matt Damon and Emily Blunt. Suspenseful flick based on the short story "The Adjustment Team," by Philip K. Dick. Rated PG-13.

"Beastly" starring Alex Pettyfer, Vanessa Hudgeons, Mary-Kate Olsen and Neil Patrick Harris. This modern-day fairytale is based on the book of the same name by Alex Finn. Rated PG-13.

"Jane Eyre" This new version of the classic gothic romance stars Mia Wasikowska, Michael Fassbender, and the always excellent Judi Dench. From the book by Charlotte Bronte. Rated PG-13.

"Kill the Irishman" Based on the true story of Danny Green, an Irish mobster in 1970's Cleveland. Starring Ray Stevenson, Vincent D'Onofrio, Val Kilmer and Christopher Walken. Based on the book, TO KILL THE IRISHMAN: The War That Crippled the Mafia by Rick Porrello. Rated R.

"Mars Needs Moms" featuring Joan Cusack and Dan Fogler. Digital 3-D based on MARS NEEDS MOMS! by Berkeley Breathed. Rated PG.

"Little Red Riding Hood" starring Amanda Seyfried and Gary Oldman in this dark retelling of the classic fairytale. Rated PG-13.

"Limitless" starring the always scrumptious Bradley Cooper, Abbie Cornish and Robert De Niro. This thriller is based on the book THE DARK FIELDS by Alan Glynn and is rated PG-13.

"The Lincoln Lawyer" boasts a star-studded cast, including Matthew McConaughey, Marisa Tomei and Ryan Phillippe. This legal thriller is based on the novel by the same name by best-selling author Michael Connelly. Rated R.

"Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules" is the second movie based on the super-popular children's series by Jeff Kinney. Zachary Gordon, Steve Zahn and Rachael Harris all return for more wimpy fun! Rated PG.

Bookies Book Club!

Bookies will be meeting Saturday, March 19th at the Minooka Village Hall from 10-12 p.m. We will be discussing The History of Love by Nicole Krauss and Henry's Sisters by Cathy Lamb.

As an extra special treat, we will be speaking with Cathy Lamb by phone during our discussion! As always, copies of our next books will be available for pickup. Looking forward to seeing you there!

Suck on This Year by Denis Leary

Chances are, if you are a Denis Leary fan, you will enjoy this book. It basically is a compilation of his "best" tweets of 2010, so if you follow him on Twitter or Facebook, you've probably already read most of these. If not, many of Leary's usual targets make an appearance, such as the Catholic Church, Lindsey Lohan, Sarah Palin, etc.

That being said, this is a book of Twitter updates - so 140 characters or less - with one update per page (@ 112 pages,) equals a really, really super fast read! Leary himself calls this more of a pamphlet than an actual book. If you are looking for something that will make you laugh, think and maybe get a little angry that you can read in about 10 or 15 minutes, this is the book for you! A percentage of monies from the purchase of this book goes to the Leary Firefighters Foundation as well.

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah

Ishmael Beah was a 12-year old boy growing up in his village in Sierra Leone when his world was shattered forever by civil war. After fleeing the area for safer ground, he and a group of boys his age survived by roaming the countryside under the radar of both the rebel front and the army, while scavenging or stealing whatever food they could. Eventually, his luck runs out and he is "recruited" by the army, where he is drugged, brainwashed, and molded into a trained killer.

The life Ishmael leads as a soldier is difficult to read about, especially knowing that he is a young boy perpetrating and witnessing unspeakable horrors on other human beings. He is a leader among his peers and gains his lieutenant's attention with both his soldiering abilities and his love of Shakespeare. At the age of 15, he and a handful of his compatriots are removed from the front and taken to a rehab center sponsored by UNICEF, where he eventually overcomes his drug addiction, begins the healing process and is welcomed into his uncle's home as a son. When he is selected to travel to New York for a United Nations conference on children and war, it is a trip that again changes his life.

This book, while heartbreaking, is an important and eye-opening look at the realities of life for children and families around the world. Ishmael was so fortunate - many of his friends returned to the war after rehab because they had nowhere else to go. While this is a book about war and the damage it causes, it is also a testament to love and hope of a better way. This is a book I would highly recommend to both adults and high school students - it is a story that will stay with them long after they have finished reading.

The Wednesday Letters by Jason Wright

I consider myself to be a fast reader - that is, I can speed through most books at a decent pace while still comprehending what it is that I am reading. Rarely, if ever, have I made it through a book as quickly as I did The Wednesday Letters, which, at the very least, was a mercifully quick read. The speed at which I was able to read, however is indicative of the overall depth of both the story and characters.

The premise of this book is sweet and promising - a husband and wife pass away together, drawing their three grown children back home. As the children deal with the loss of their parents, they discover boxes and boxes of letters that their father wrote to their mother every - wait for it - Wednesday - during their life together. Together, the kids discover a family secret that none of them could have guessed. Amazingly, the plot surrounding the devastating revelations and sub-plots are all neatly wrapped up on one whirlwind weekend of mourning.

I do not want to include any spoilers in case anyone would like to give this book a try - to be fair, it did receive a positive review from Publishers Weekly, and lots of people on Amazon reviewed it glowingly as well. From my perspective, this book was offensive to women, overly didactic, and completely lacking in any sort of character development or logical plot evolution. I would be interested in hearing other reader's takes on this particular title, however, and am REALLY looking forward to our book club discussion on it!

The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott

Like so many women of a certain age, one of my favorite books growing up was Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. Jo March was and always will be a heroine of mine, and Louisa and Jo, in my mind, were one and the same.

Author Kelly O'Connor McNees, also a fan of Little Women and Louisa May Alcott, took the opportunity to do some research and create a fictionalized account of one of Louisa's summers of which little to no documentation survives. We were fortunate enough to have Ms. McNees join us at the Minooka Branch, where she provided a reading from the book, answered questions from the audience and signed copies of her book.

The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott takes place during the summer that Alcott's family spent in Walpole, New Hampshire, when Louisa was 22 years old. During the course of the summer, in this fictionalized account of her life, Louisa falls in love. McNees deftly weaves her story in with fact, producing a hopeful yet very human heroine. This is a bittersweet and nostalgic book that I would highly recommend to any fans of Alcott, historical fiction or romance.

Check out the very wonderful and lovely Kelly O'Connor McNees at her website as well:

http://kellyoconnormcnees.com/