Book: The Final Gambit

 Book: The Final Gambit

Author: Jennifer Lynne Barnes

Pages: 386

This is my 134th read for the year

What Amazon says:

To inherit billions, all Avery Kylie Grambs has to do is survive a few more weeks living in Hawthorne House.  The paparazzi are dogging her every step.  Financial pressures are building.  Danger is a fact of life.  And the only thing getting Avery through it all is the Hawthorne brothers.  Her life is intertwined with theirs.  She knows their secrets and they know her.  But as the clock tickets down to the moment when Avery will become the richest teenager on the planet, trouble arrives in the form of a visitor who needs her help - and whose presence in Hawthorne House could change everything.  It soons becomes clear that there is one last puzzle to solve, and Avery and the Hawthorn brothers are drawn into a dangerous game against an unknown and powerful player.  Secrets upon secrets.  Riddles upon riddles.  In this game, there are hearts and lives as stake - and there is nothing more Hawthorn than winning.

This is the 3rd book in the Inheritence Game series.  While I am still enjoying it, I found this book the weekest one so far  I think Barnes was having a hard time advancing this story along.  This one I found harder to follow - a lot of characters and a lot of knew family members made it is a bit convoluted.  The puzzles and mystery were just as good as the past, but all the other stuff got a bit tiresome.  And the love story is a bit bigger in this one.  There are three more books in the series, but I think they are more off shoots than continuation, so I might take a break and come back to them later.

STars: 3.5

Book: Buried In The Sky

 Book: Buried in the Sky

Author: Peter Zuckerman

Pages: 320

This is my 133rd read for the year

What Amazon says:

When 11 climbers died on K2 in 2008, 2 Sherpas survived.  Their astonishing tale became the stuff of mountaineering legend.  This white-knuckle adventure follows the Sherpas from their remote villages in Nepal to the peak of the world's most dangerous mountain, recounting one of the most dramatic disasters in apline history from a fascinating new perspective.

This was an interesting book.  I found it when researching something else and did not know there was a tragedy on K2 like there was on Everest (which I read in John Krakauer's book Into Thin Air).  This is a book about the Sherpas and others who help the hikers up and down these mountains as much as it is about the tragedy.  We learn the backstory of many of the Sherpas and climbers that lead to the fatal hike.  Glad I found this one.

Stars: 4

Book: The Spymaters: How The CIA shaped History and the Future

 Book: The Spymasters

Author: Chris Whipple

Pages: 400

This is my 132nd read for the year

What Amazon says:

Only 11 men and 1 woman are alive today who have made the life and death decisions that come with running the world's most powerful and influential intelligence service.  With unprecedented, deep access to nearly all these individuals plus several of their predecessors, Chris Whipple tells the story of an agency that answers to the US president alone, but whose activities - spying, espionage, and covert action - take place on every continent.  At pivotal moments, the CIA acts as a break on rogue presidents, starting in the mid 70s with DCI Richard Helm's refusal to conceal Richard Nixon's criminality and continuing to the present as the actions of a CIA whistleblower have ignited impeachment proceedings against Donald Trump.  Since its inception in 1947, the CIA has been a powerful player on the world stage, operating largely in the shadows to protect American interests.  For The Spymasters, Whipple conducted extensive, exclusive interviews with nearly every living CIA director, pulling back the curtain on the world's elite spy agencies and showing how the CIA partners - or clashes - with counterparts in Britain, France, Germany, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Russia.  

This was a pretty interesting book.  It is well written and quite thorough coverage of the CIA over the years.  Each president form Nixon to Trump are covered in this book and how the CIA worked with them.  (I can give you a pretty good idea how that last one is going).  I learned a lot about the CIA in general and new information related to different difficulties each President faced.  Good book.

Stars: 4 

Book: Home is Where The Bodies Are

 Book: Home is where the bodies are

Author: Jeneva Rose

Pages: 288

This is my 131st read for the year

What Amazon says:

After their mother passes, three estranged siblings reunite to sort out her estate.  Beth, the oldest, never left home.  She stayed with her mom, caring for her until the very end.  Nicole, the middle child, has been kept at arm's length due to her ongoing battle with a serious drug addiction.  Michael, the youngest, lives out of state and hasn't been back to their small Wisconsin town since their father ran out on them 7 years before.  While going through their parents' belongings, the siblings stumble upon a collection of home videos and decide to revisit those happier memories.  However, the nostalgia is cut short when one of the VHS tapes reveals a night back in 1999 that none of them have any recollection of.  On screen, their father appears covered in blood.  What follows is a dead body and a pact between their parents to get rid of it, before the video abruptly ends.  Beth, Nicole, and Michale must now decide whether to leave the past in the past or uncover the dark secret their mother took to her grave.

This book is fine.  It moves along just fine, but there is a lot of "hate/love" back and forth that always drives me crazy in books.  Especially short ones.  I didn't care much for any of the characters, but I was curious to see what the end result was going to be.  And the ending did surprise me, so kudos to that.  

Stars: 3.5

Book: A Slow Fire Burning

 Book: A Slow Fire Burning

Author: Paula Hawkins

Pages: 400

This is my 130th read for the year

What Amazon says:

When a young man is found gruesomely murdered in a London houseboat, it triggers questions about 3 women who knew him.  Laura is the troubled 1 night stand last seen in the victim's home.  Carla is his grief-stricken aunt, already mourning the recent death of yet another family member.  And Miriam is the nosy neighbor clearly keeping secrets from the police.  3 women with separate connections to the victim.  3 women who are - for different reasons - simmering with resentment.  Who are, whether they know it or not, burning to right the wrongs done to them. When it comes to revenge, even good people might be capable of terrible deeds.  How far might any one of them go to find peace?  How long can secrets smolder before they explode into flame?

I found this one an easy read and highly entertaining.  It moves along pretty well and I am left wondering who the killer was for a long time.  It was easy to pick up on who it wasn't, but not so much on who it was.  It was a mild plot twist as is, I was a bit surprised, but not overly so.  I would say my negative for this book is the names of the characters - which I know is silly.  So may characters that end with the letter "a" it started to get a bit hard to follow (I listened to this one).  Overall, a solid read.

Stars: 4

Book: The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise

 Book: The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise

Author: Dan Gemeinhart

Pages: 352

This is my 129th read for the year

What Amazon says:

Five years.  That's how long Coyote and her dad, Rodeo, have lived on the road in an old school bus, criss-crossing the nation.  It's also how long ago Coyote lost her mom and two sisters in a car crash.  Coyote hasn't been home in all that time, but when she learns that the park in her old neighborhood is being demolished - the very same park where she, her mom, and her sisters buried a treasured memory boy - she devises an elaborate plan to get her dad to drive 3600 miles back to Washington state in 4 days - without him realizing it.  Along the way, they'll pick up a strange crew of misfit travelers.  Lester has a lady love to meet.  Salvador and his mom are looking to start over.  Val needs a safe place to be herself.  And then there's Gladys.... Over the course of 1000s of miles, Coyote will learn that going home can sometimes be the hardest journey of all - but that with friends by her side, she just might be able to turn her "once upon a time" into a happily ever after".  

This was a pretty good book.  It has a sweet understory - a family picking up people who needed a place to be for a short while all while Coyote and her dad figure out how do deal with the worst kind of grief.  It has some silly parts, and some odd parts, but over all it is well written and flows nicely.  Good ending and a good lesson.

Stars: 4

Book: Bury our Bones in the Midnight Soil

 Book: Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

Author: V.E. Schwab

Pages: 544

This was my 127th read for the year

What Amazon Says:

This is a story about hunger.  1532.  Santo Domingo de la Calzada.  A young girl grows up wild and wily - her beauty is only outmatched by her dreams of escape.  But Maria knows she can only ever be a prize, or a pawn, in the games played by men.  When an alluring stranger offers an alternate path, Maria makes a desperate choice.  She vows to have no regrets.  This is a story about love.  1827.  London.  A young woman lives an idyllic but cloistered life on her family's estate, until a moment of forbidden intimacy sees her shipped off to London.  Charlotte's tender heart and seemingly impossible wishes are swept away by an invitation from a beautiful widow -but the price of freedom is higher than she could have imagined.  This is a story about rage.  2019 Boston.  College was supposed to be her chance to be someone new.  That's why Alice moved halfway across the world, leaving her old life behind.  But after an out-of-character one night stand leaves her questioning her past, her present, and her future, Alice throws herself into the hunt for answers....and revenge.  This is a story about life - how it ends, and how it starts.

This was a pretty good book.  The writing was spectaular.  There is no doubt in my opinion that VE Schwab is a talented writer.  A was a little disappointed with the subject matter (I won't give it away because it felt like it was supposed to be a surprise) - so overdone.  Didn't love a lot of the characters - but not sure you are meant to.  They are pretty self absorbed, but true to most stories about this particular subject....it tracks.  I liked the back and forth of the story lines.  Didn't have a favorite of the three. The beginning and the end were solid and the middle was okay.

Stars: 4