The Queen Elizabeth mystery series, by SJ Bennett

For some delightful, well-written mysteries, I recommend a series by SJ Bennett that I have recently read: "The Windsor Knot" (2021); "The Queen's Men" (2022), and "Murder Most Royal: Her Majesty the Queen Investigates" (2023), all published by William Morrow. Readers of this blog may remember that I have had a lifelong love of mysteries, but with occasional "breaks" away from the genre for months or years at a time. I have been mostly in a "break" phase for at least a couple of years lately. But when I ran across this series about Queen Elizabeth of England's doing some detecting and solving of mysteries, I was hooked. The series, set in the past few years, shows the Queen as interested in, and very clever about, investigating and solving murder cases in her own palaces and castles. But she does it very discreetly, only confiding in and getting help from a high-level female aide. She then drops indirect clues to the police in charge of investigating, allowing them to think they have been the ones to solve the cases. I admit I also enjoy the parts of these novels about the palaces and castles and social events where the events take place. And I like the way the author has some fun with slightly puncturing the egos of some pompous high-level (male) police officials who, condescending to her advanced age and perceived removal from "regular life," believe that the Queen may not understand the intricacies of their thinking, and feel they need to explain them to her; in fact, they have been -- unknown to them -- completely "managed" by her. I have some emotional connection to the British royalty, because of my Canadian background, and my grandmother who adored the royal family. Yet I also understand the objections many people have to the system of royalty persisting into the current day. But -- back to these three novels -- if you enjoy mystery novels, and don't have objections to light, enjoyable, well-written mysteries in which the "detective" happens to be the Queen of England, you may well enjoy these three very much, as I did.

"The Upstairs Delicatessen," by Dwight Garner

How could I resist a book titled "The Upstairs Delicatessen: On Eating, Reading, Reading about Eating, and Eating While Reading" (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2023)? For someone like me (and, I imagine, many of you) who also loves to read, loves to eat, loves to read about eating, and loves to eat while reading....well, this book is irresistible! Regular readers of this blog of course know how much I like to read, but also may have noticed that I have fairly frequently posted about books about the restaurant world and other food-related topics. The author of this book, Dwight Garner, is a longtime book critic at The New York Times, and is obviously, not surprisingly, tremendously well read. In this book he writes enthusiastically about food and his own experiences with food and restaurants; the book is crammed with entertaining anecdotes, as well as with many quotations by famous authors about food (and drink). The tone of the book is light, generous, humorous, joyous, and celebratory of the pleasures of life.

"A Widow's Story," by Joyce Carol Oates

Not to dwell on loss, as I have in some recent posts, but I just read "A Widow's Story" (Ecco, 2011), by Joyce Carol Oates, a powerful, wrenching telling of the story of the first few months of the famous author's widowhood in 2008. She recounts the story in a series of short snapshots of events and of her intense emotional experiences. This style has the effect of a series of punches in the gut (forgive the cliche that Oates herself would never use). She and her husband Raymond Smith, a fellow professor and an editor, had been married for decades, and were extremely close. His illness was fairly sudden, and Oates was completely unprepared for his death. She goes over all the "what ifs," and questions and blames herself, wondering if she could or should have done more, done things differently. She becomes so distraught that she takes several medications for insomnia and anxiety, and at various points considers, or at least contemplates, suicide. Yet at the same time she forces herself to continue with her professional life, going on a long planned book tour within days of her husband's death, priding herself on not letting anyone down and on not showing her devastating grief. She also struggles with all the tasks that a survivor has to deal with: legal and financial matters, deciding what to do with her husband's duties and possessions, etc. (On a personal note, I will add here that everyone I know who has gone through a spouse's -- or other close family member's -- death and the aftermath is shocked at both the stunning depth of their own grief, and the plethora of logistical tasks that await them, in the midst of their mourning and feeling of paralysis. All of this is very familiar to me since my husband's death.) I couldn't have read this book very soon after my husband died, but now that it has been almost two years, I could and did. So much of it resonated with me, although not all, of course. On a surprise note, not mentioned in the book, except for a very vague allusion on the very last page, is that Oates met and married someone else -- another professor -- about a year later. I must admit that before I read this book, I had heard about the remarriage, and almost didn't read the book because of that. How could she do that after her long, good marriage? How could she go from devastating grief to finding a new partner so quickly? Then I thought about it more, and chided myself for being judgmental; who was I to judge the grief of anyone else, or what works for them or consoles them? In any case, this is a powerful, and (not surprisingly!) well-written book, and I recommend it for anyone who is ready for it, but with the warning that it is very difficult, painful, and emotional to read.

"A Living Remedy," by Nicole Chung

Regular readers of this blog know that next to novels, my favorite genre is memoirs. They may also know that I have recently had a major loss in my life, with the death of my husband. And of course, like all of us, I have had earlier losses too, including those of both my parents and of several close friends. I find myself drawn to memoirs about bereavement. Reading such memoirs is often painful, but also makes me feel connected to others who have experienced this huge change in one's life (which of course, eventually, is everyone...). They too know the great pain of loss of loved ones, and the intense grieving that follows, with all of its manifestations (emotional, mental, physical, social, and logistical). Nicole Chung's memoir, "A Living Remedy" (Ecco, 2023) describes the illnesses and deaths of both of her parents within two years, in the context of Chung's complicated relationship with them and their surroundings, and her painful sense of not being able to do enough for them during their illnesses. Chung is Korean-American, and was adopted as an infant by a white American couple living in a rural part of Oregon; she is their only child. Chung loves them very much, but being the only Asian person in her schools and area, was determined to leave home as soon as she could. She was an excellent student, and received scholarships that enabled her to attend a good East Coast college. Although she loved her parents, and stayed in regular touch, her job and marriage and parenthood prevented her from visiting them very often in the ensuing years. As they became ill, she struggled with feeling inadequate to deal with their health issues, and felt guilty. Although this is a sad story, full of regret and grief, it is clear that there was much love on both sides, and that love becomes the overriding truth that allows everyone to experience grace during the wrenching time of illness, death, and mourning.

"Pete and Alice in Maine," by Caitlin Shetterly

Good reviews, along with blurbs by two of my favorite authors -- Richard Russo and Alice Elliott Dark -- impelled me to read "Pete and Alice in Maine" (Harper, 2023), by Caitlin Shetterly. I was also intrigued that it is one of the early novels set in the COVID-19 pandemic, and grapples with some of the on-the-ground issues that families were dealing with in the early part of the pandemic, and in some cases still. Even for those who were fortunate enough not to experience serious illness or death among their families and friends, it was (and still is in many ways) a frightening, difficult time, in large and small ways. Soon after the pandemic begins, Pete and Alice and their two children move from New York to a family home in Maine to wait it out. Of course that last sentence shows the privilege this family has, and to their credit, the couple is aware of that privilege. But, although being away from the city feels safer, and although there are the pleasures of living in a bucolic setting, there are still very real difficulties to contend with. It is hard to get necessary supplies. The local people consider Pete and Alice outsiders, and actively undermine them in various ways. The children are especially affected, with schooling issues and with emotional turmoil at times. Work also becomes harder for both the adults. The elephant in the room, in the context of the pandemic, is Pete and Alice's recently troubled marriage. Alice in particular feels betrayed, beleaguered, overwhelmed by all of the above. The descriptions of the situation and, especially, of the family dynamics, are compelling, and the book is insightful about the inner workings of marriages and families.

"Snow Road Station" and "All Things Consoled," both by Elizabeth Hay

I try to keep up at least a little bit with Canadian literature, since I was born in Canada, where my parents grew up and where I still have a large extended family, and feel connected to it, even though I have lived in two other countries (India and the United States) most of my life. But I did not know Elizabeth Hay's work until I recently read her 2023 novel, “Snow Road Station” (Knopf Canada). It is a wrenching story about a woman in her sixties, an actor who feels herself being edged out of the theater world and retreats to the small town of Snow Road Station, Ontario. There she tries to assess her life, past and present; her perspective is bleak. The big focus, aside from but related to her loss of career and identity, is her lifelong essential but complex friendship with another woman, as they try to untangle their lives and the friendship. This is a beautiful book, but not actually the one I especially want to focus on in this post. Reading “Snow Road Station” led me to Hay’s piercing, melancholy, grief-filled memoir, “All Things Consoled” (McClelland & Stewart, 2018), one that manages, despite the grim events that Hay describes, to be life-affirming. The focus of the memoir is the difficult, trying time in which her parents are aging, and the ways in which Hay’s often fraught relationship with her parents in the past complicates her current relationship with them as, despite herself, she worries more and more about them, and takes on more and more of their caregiving. This memoir is so moving, so uncomfortable, so heartbreaking to read that I can barely write about it. But it is also so important, so beautiful that I feel compelled to bring it to your attention. The pain is in the way that the heartbreak co-exists with so much (complicated) love. Hay describes her parents so well, such as her father’s frightening temper and her mother’s extreme frugality. The details of these qualities and other aspects of their lives are distressing but perfectly wrought. And the situation of adult children’s taking care of, worrying about, tending to, loving but sometimes resenting their elderly parents, is so common that many readers will be able to relate to it, even if the particulars of their situations and feelings are different. I highly recommend this gorgeously written memoir.

"Somebody's Fool," by Richard Russo

On 8/13/23, I wrote here with great enthusiasm about Ann Patchett’s new novel, “Tom Lake.” Soon after, I read the newest novel of another of my very favorite authors, Richard Russo, and read it with equal enthusiasm. The novel, titled “Somebody’s Fool” (Knopf, 2023) is the third in Russo’s “North Bath” trilogy; the first two novels are “Nobody’s Fool” (1993) and “Everybody’s Fool” (2016) (about which I posted here in some detail on 5/14/16, including some amateur analysis of gendered aspects of writing displayed by many novelists, but transcended, in my view, by Russo). Each novel in the trilogy stands alone; one does not have to have read the earlier novels to thoroughly enjoy “Somebody’s Fool” (although I highly recommend reading all three!). But the site (North Bath, located in Upstate New York, and surroundings) and many of the characters, are the same, but at different time periods. Sully, the complicated, flawed, tough-but-kind, part eccentric and part working-class-male-archetype main character in the two earlier novels, has now died, but his legacy still pervades this most recent novel. The characters in the novels all know each other and each other’s histories and strengths and foibles, in the way of small towns everywhere. I mentioned Ann Patchett in my first sentence here, not only because she and Russo are both such essential and treasured writers for me, but because they share some qualities. They are both profoundly humane in their treatment of their characters, and in their attitudes toward life. They both care deeply about, and thoroughly understand their characters, and they care most of all about the relationships among those characters’ family members, friends, lovers, co-workers, and neighbors. And both authors care about the settings of their novels: they describe them in clear and loving detail. I must add that Russo’s novels also have intriguing plots that keep readers involved, and that his novels, including this one, are suffused with humor.