Rachel Kovaciny's Blog, page 17

"Red Harvest" by Dashiell Hammett

I have no memory of this book.  I KNOW I read all of Hammett's novels about twenty years ago.  But the title is the only familiar part about it.  I didn't even remember that the main character is the Continental Op.  Weird.  Or maybe not weird -- I read all of Hammett's novels in a row, in a big anthology I got from the library, and they did kinda smush together in my brain.  So that's probably why it didn't feel familiar.
Anyway!  I thought at first this book was going to be about fighting Commu...

Hey, Guess What?!?

My latest book, My Rock and My Refuge, has been selected as a 2023 Finalist in the WILLA Literary Awards Young Adult Fiction and Nonfiction category!

God is so good!  I have dreamed of someday winning this award for pretty much the entire ten years I have been writing western novels.  To even be a finalist (which is like a runner-up) is such an honor. I thank God for blessing my writing efforts and helping me become a better storyteller with every book and story I write. To God be the glory! 
The ...

"Mara, Daughter of the Nile" by Eloise Jarvis McGraw

I've got mixed feelings about this book.
On the one hand, the historical details and worldbuilding are fantastic.  I took a history class on Egypt and the Ancient Near East back in college, and reading this brought back so many good memories of that class and the professor, who was my favorite history prof.  
The characters were nuanced and believable, and mainly likeable.  I didn't like some of the things that Mara in particular did, but I understood why her history as a slave and her desperation...

"Playback" by Raymond Chandler

Man, this book has given me such a bad book hangover.  I don't even remember the last time I had such a severe one.  Usually, I am reading at least two books at once, and so I just naturally keep on reading my other book whenever I finish one.  And then I transition into another pretty smoothly.  But this book... I just can't leave it behind yet.  I finished it two days ago and, up until the last chapter, I was just kind of okay with it, but not loving it as much as Chandler's other novels... an...

"Lando" by Louis L'Amour

Now, that's what I call a rousing good adventure story!
Lando Sackett leaves the Appalachian mountains as a young man, hunted by three of his uncles who are convinced he knows where there's a fabulous buried treasure.  Not Sackett uncles, of course, but his mother's brothers.  Lando and a man known only as the Tinker strike out to find their fortunes in the West, but the Tinker turns out to be involved with that buried treasure too.  After many misadventures and a stint in a Mexican prison where ...

"In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson" by Bette Bao Lord

This is such a fun, upbeat book!  It's set in 1947, when Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in baseball, but it's actually about a little girl from China who moves to New York City with her mom to be with her dad, who had previously come to the USA to find work.  The little girl has to choose an American name for herself, so she picks the only American-sounding name she knows and likes: Shirley Temple.
Shirley Temple Wong doesn't speak English, doesn't know how to roller skate, can't play ba...

Top Ten Tuesday: In a Word (July 18)

This week's Top Ten Tuesday subject from That Artsy Reader Girl is "Books with One-Word Titles."  I am not counting articles (a, an, the) in this, just FYI.  I've gathered up my favorites and linked their titles to my reviews of them, and given you a hint of what you can find in each one too!

The Outsiders  by S. E. Hinton -- found family, brothers, young hoods, Robert Frost
Persuasion  by Jane Austen -- second chance at love, family strife, personal growth, female friendship
Shane  by Jack Schaefer -...

"Murder at Kensington Palace" by Andrea Penrose

Yet another thoroughly entertaining Wrexford and Sloane mystery!  I won't say this one was thoroughly enjoyable because it had a couple of quite grisly murders and involved the subject of people doing scientific experiments on themselves and on dead bodies, which is kinda icky.  Not nasty or repulsive to the point where I felt squeamish, just... a bit ew.  
When Charlotte Sloane's cousin is murdered, and his twin is arrested for the murder, she sets out to prove the surviving brother innocent.  N...

"The Detective's Assistant" by Kate Hannigan

Remember when I read Girl in Disguise  by Greer McAllister a few years ago and lamented that there are no biographies about Kate Warne, the first female Pinkerton Detective?  There still aren't any good adult biographies of her, and that still bothers me.  BUT there are a few more books around these days that involve her, and that makes me really happy, because she wows me.
The Detective's Assistant is a middle-grade fiction book that is a great way to introduce younger folks to Kate Warne.  In th...

"Thornrose Estate" by Kendra E. Ardnek

This book is a whirlwind!  An amnesiac heroine (who repeatedly forgets things in the past), a shape-shifting hero, a horrible curse to untangle, and a friends-to-lovers arc that I loved.  Not to mention some found family elements too!
Calla (who was a side character for much of the previous book in the series, Snowfield Palace ) has grown up in a small cottage in the middle of nowhere.  She can't remember the last nine years of her life, but her guardians assure her that when she turns nineteen, s...