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Quirky Characters, a Charming Setting and Topical Issues: Louise Penny’s A Better Man

4 May

A Better Man
Take a small rural Canadian village. A bistro serving almond croissants and café au lait. A quirky cast of core characters, with a few new faces mixed in each new book of the series.

Mix in some current topical issues, in this case the effects of environmental change, social media reality and the how impressions can be shaped there by anonymity, doctored videos and the viral nature of opinions. Add other dark aspects of life, like violence against women.

What you get is a somewhat cozy mystery with enough rough reality mixed in that you won’t gag from the sweetness.

It’s a formula that is repeated throughout this now 15 book long series. Armand Gamache, an officer of the Surete du Quebec lives with his extended family in the (fictional) village of Three Pines in Quebec. He deals with various crimes (a rather shocking amount, for such a backwater) as well as issues within the Surete du Quebec. He carries the baggage of decisions he has made in his career in each new book. In this one, he is looking into the disappearance of a woman known to have been abused by her husband. He is helped by his son-in-law Jean-Guy Beauvoir, and other Surete agents that have appeared in previous books in the series.

I hesitate to make the suggestion, because it is a rather substantial reading commitment, but it really is best to read the series in order. There is enough explanation of the backstories of the major plot developments to get you through each book as a stand-alone, but your enjoyment will be deeper for seeing characters develop over time. Penny doesn’t pull any punches. She is not afraid to write main characters out of the script or involve plot twists that will shock you.

A list of the series in order from the first to the most recent is: Still Life, A Fatal Grace/Dead Cold (same book, different title), The Cruelest Month, A Rule Against Murder/The Murder Stone (same book, different title), The Brutal Telling, Bury Your Dead, A Trick of the Light, The Beautiful Mystery, How the Light Gets In, The Long Way Home, The Nature of the Beast, A Great Reckoning, Glass Houses, Kingdom of the Blind, and A Better Man.  You can find them as ebooks and/or digital audiobooks to checkout from eLibraryNJ, eBCCLS, and Hoopla.

If you require s bit more convincing, take a look at Louise Penny’s web site, which features reviews and more describing the books in detail.

What I enjoy about the series is the morality of Armand Gamache and the plotting that keeps each book both familiar and surprising. And the food! The characters frequently indulge in food and drink at the bistro or at get-togethers at the villagers’ homes that sound awesome.

Written by:
Victoria Turk
Reference Librarian

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Understanding Grief with YA Verse Fiction

29 Apr

Grief from loss is a common occurrence among those that know someone that has passed away during this chaotic time. Mourning the passing of someone comes in different ways. Grief can be expressed through anger, sadness, and even an extreme action. For poetry month, these two fiction young adult books will show the reader different ways characters grieved in a time of instability.

Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds
Long Way Down
Will’s brother got gunned down on his way to the neighborhood bodega. He and his grief-stricken mother try to process Shawn’s death. Will retreats to “the rules” in his grieving for his brother. There are three rules which are not to cry, not to snitch (tell who did it), and get revenge. These three rules create a toxic cycle of gun violence in his neighborhood. Will learns this in his grief when he steals his brother’s gun and descends the elevator to find and kill the person that killed his brother. The majority of the story takes place in the elevator that goes down seven floors. On each level, a person from Will’s life connected to gun violence boards the elevator. Each person like his father, classmate, confides in him how “the rules” played a part in their murders. The reader takes in the heart-wrenching drama through a variety of verses that would leave the reader questioning if Will is open enough to take in the message that he is receiving from beyond the grave.  It is available from elibraryNJ and eBCCLS as ebooks and digital audiobooks.

Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
Out of the Dust
In this historical verse fiction, readers get to learn about a very different America in the early 1930s. The Great Depression was very hard on the average American but especially hard for Americans that lived in Oklahoma like Billie Jo. She is a 15-year-old girl that tries to survive during the Great Dust Bowl. Oklahoma’s countryside was overtaken by dry land due to over-farming and drought. The book begins with Billie Jo’s seemingly happy. When a horrible tragedy affects her and her mother, things fall apart! Hesse does a beautiful job telling the story of grief, family, and adversity through the spirit of a spunky teenage girl.  It is available from eBCCLS as an ebook and eLibraryNJ as an ebook and digital audiobook.

Written by:
Elbie Love
YA Library Associate

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