Night and Its Longings

A dark, deeply engrossing crime noir about a soul-searching, middle-aged writer determined to find out what happened to his missing ex. 

Night and Its Longings is a hauntingly atmospheric, beautifully crafted crime noir written by accomplished novelist, short story writer, poet, playwright and filmmaker, Philip Cioffari.

 

The book, set in June 1995, centers on Jake Garrett, a “less-than-famous,” hardboiled crime novelist. On the brink of age 40, Jake is “short on money and friends.” He does his best writing late at night and often keeps company via the disaffected, spiritually wounded lonely-hearts who call in to an after-midnight, radio program. Jake has been known to take walks in the shadowy wee-hours, through "abandoned city streets, past shuttered bars, darkened storefronts."

 

“I wasn’t what you’d call a fearful man, except in the way most life-long New Yorkers are fearful,” Jake tells the reader. “Never leaving my car unlocked. Always keeping tabs on my surroundings. Trusting my sixth-sense to detect danger…The fact of the matter was this: the self was the enemy I feared most, not strangers on the street.”

 

One night, just as Jake is hitting his writing stride--drawing “wisdom in dark hours”--he’s jarred by a knock on the door that opens onto the courtyard of his Village (New York City) apartment building. There, he is surprised by Norm Davison, the husband of Vera Davison, a woman with whom Jake had a passionate, one-year love affair ten years prior. After Vera went back to Norm, Vera and Jake had lost touch. However, on this dark night, the spirit of Vera is suddenly resurrected in a chilling and foreboding way.

 

Norm is beside himself, worried about Vera, who has disappeared for 11 days. Is she in danger? Alive? Dead? Did she leave by force or vanish voluntarily? Norm, Vera’s husband, is frustrated by the police investigation. While he was aware of Jake and Vera’s affair, he is now desperate to find his wife—this includes his enlisting his wife’s adulterous ex-lover to aid the search.

 

What ensues is a dark, deepening story that reveals, layer by layer, details of the love affair shared between Jake and Vera and the life Vera went on to live without Jake—as a wife, mother, and budding photographer. When Norm allows Jake access into the minutia of Vera’s life--including his poring over her journals and photographs--even more questions arise. Amidst an extensive search that winds through New York and later, South Carolina, Jake’s crime-writing detective skills are put into action. Along the way, he begins to search his own soul, realizing that Vera’s departure from his life created a “dead center” in him—an abyss of sorrow, guilt, and regret. Might Vera have experienced a similar void?

 

The introspective intrigue of Jake’s narrative voice propels a suspenseful plot where danger unspools via short, ratcheting chapters. Cioffari (If Anyone Asks, Says I Died from the Heartbreaking Blues) delivers a spellbinding--profoundly thought-provoking--literary mystery that ultimately unravels with surprising twists.  

 

Night and Its Longings by Philip Cioffari

Livingston Press, $18.99 paperback, 978-1604893748, 234 pages

Publishing Date: March 26, 2024

To order this book on INDIEBOUND/Bookshop.Org, link HERE

 

To learn more about Philip Cioffari and his extensive body of work, link HERE

What the Dead Know

A dedicated medical examiner from the City of New York shares fascinating, soul-searching stories that came to define her career—and her life. 

Barbara Butcher is one tough lady. Only the second woman ever appointed to serve as a death investigator in Manhattan, she helped solve crimes that could’ve calloused and darkened her heart many times over. However, in her fascinating, down to earth memoir, What the Dead Know, she tells riveting personal stories about investigating homicides, suicides, and tragic accidents that moved and changed her life in extraordinary ways.

 

Butcher came to the profession through a series of unexpected, fortunate events. A teen who suffered from depression and suicidal impulses--and experimented with drugs--she struggled for direction after high school. A woman she worked for at a nursing home took note of Butcher’s potential and encouraged her to become a physician assistant. College coursework on anatomy, physiology, chemistry, pathology, and solving diagnosis puzzles lit a fire under Butcher’s ambitions. She did work stints in surgery and gynecology, and went on to earn a master’s degree in public health. Just as Butcher was en route to a cushy but boring career as a hospital administrator, her personal life unraveled. After she hit rock bottom, she found Alcoholics Anonymous and some career counseling. Butcher was deemed best suited for a career as a coroner.

 

Inquisitive readers--especially fans of mysteries and true crime--will be captivated by Butcher’s appealing, conversational writing style. She presents a trove of detailed, sobering case studies of how notorious investigations--including a chilling section about her work during 9-11--often wore her down while also expanding her skill set and intellect, enriching the depths of her character. 

 

What the Dead Know: Learning About Life as a New York City Death Investigator by Barbara Butcher

Simon and Schuster, $26.99 hardcover, 288 pages, 9781982179380

Publishing Date: June 20, 2023

 

To order this book on INDIEBOUND/Bookshop.Org, link HERE

 

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different from) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review as published on Shelf Awareness for the Book Trade (May 11, 2023), link HERE

A shortened version of this same review was published on Shelf Awareness for Readers (June 23, 2023). Link HERE to read that review.

Recipe for a Perfect Wife

A powerful, thought-provoking story about the choices that ultimately come to define and liberate two women who lived 60 years apart.

Characters often face difficult choices--and learn how to live with the consequences--in the novels of Karma Brown (TheChoices We Make). In Recipe for a Perfect Wife, she continues this theme, chronicling the lives of two women who lived nearly 60 years apart.

In 2018, 29-year-old Alice Hale and her husband, Nate, move from a "shoebox-size" apartment in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan to a sprawling colonial house in Greenville, a suburban town "less than an hour's train ride from the city and yet an entirely different world." Alice has apprehensions about the retro fixer-upper, but nevertheless makes the adjustment.

While Nate commutes to his city job, Alice, having left her career and friends behind to write a novel, feels a deep loneliness. When she finds a vintage cookbook in the basement and begins whipping up some of the recipes, her anxiety and depression start to lift. She becomes intrigued and wants to find out all she can about Nellie Murdoch, the previous owner of the cookbook and the house.

As Alice learns more about Nellie's life, she faces unexpected crises that force her to rethink choices she's made, secrets she's kept and actions she may need to take in the future. Patriarchal dilemmas abound for both women. Yet, through the wisdom evoked by revelations in Nellie's life story, Alice is suddenly inspired and empowered better to deal with her own challenges.

Strong, well-drawn women anchor Brown's deeply thought-provoking, feminist novel. The spellbinding dual stories complement each other, raising themes of self-discovery, self-preservation and liberation for two women living eras apart.

Recipe for a Perfect Wife (A Novel) by Karma Brown

Dutton, $26.00 Hardcover, 9781524744939, 336 pages

Publication Date: December 31, 2019

To order this book on INDIEBOUND, link HERE

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (January 10, 2020), link HERE

To read the longer form of this review as published on Shelf Awareness for the Book Trade (December 6, 2019), link HERE

This Could Hurt

A shrewd novel of corporate culture examines how a group of HR employees faces fallout from the Great Recession.

Corporate America during nine months of the Great Recession is the setting of This Could Hurt, Jillian Medoff's shrewd and deeply affecting fourth novel. Ellery Consumer Research--with offices in New York City, Raleigh and Atlanta--is a cutting-edge, boutique market research firm for clients like Walmart and General Motors. Medoff roots the story amid the company's shrinking human resources department in New York, offering a well-drawn ensemble cast of flawed characters who orbit around Rosalita "Rosa" Guerrero, the 64-year-old HR chief.

Rosa is a seasoned old-timer--personally and professionally. She is bossy, but fair. Her take-charge, no-nonsense approach serves as a "voice of clarity and calm" in her quest to advocate for and boost the morale of those in her department despite drastic corporate cutbacks. Rosa's predicament grows more complex when she's forced to fire the v-p of operations--a trusted confidant of Rosa and her right hand--who was being groomed as her successor, but was embezzling from the company.

His departure leaves an open door for the rest of the HR staff, most of whom are scrambling to find ways to stay employed under the corporate restructuring and downsizing. Medoff (I Couldn't Love You More) has a spot-on grasp on the often cutthroat nuances of office politics--especially within the high-stakes uncertainty of the Great Recession. She skillfully reveals the modus operandi of the staff as they vie to keep their jobs. Sharply drawn intimate details about the lives of each character add even greater depth and broaden the timeless appeal of this very smart, thoroughly absorbing story.

This Could Hurt by Jillian Medoff

Harper, $26.99 Hardcover,  9780062660763, 384  pages

Publication Date: January 9, 2018

To order this book on INDIEBOUND, link HERE

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (January 23, 2018), link HERE

To read the long-form review of this novel as featured on Shelf Awareness for the Book Trade (December 7, 2017), link HERE

Dinner with Edward

A middle-aged writer and a 93-year-old widower, both facing changes, become friends through the satiating comfort of food.

Two lost souls bond over gourmet feasts in Dinner with Edward, a memoir by investigative journalist Isabel Vincent (Gilded Lily: Lily Safra). Isabel--a middle-aged newspaper reporter transplanted to New York City as her marriage comes undone--meets a dear friend for dinner. The friend's 95-year-old mother has recently died, and she fears her father, Edward, is giving up on life. She asks Isabel to check in on him occasionally, touting Edward's culinary prowess. Isabel's loneliness in a new city ultimately propels her to show up at Edward's apartment on Roosevelt Island, armed with a bottle of wine.

One meal turns into a weekly, culinary rendezvous where meticulous and debonair Edward, a self-trained cook, whips up savory and sweet feasts, paired perfectly with cocktails. "Edward was neither a snob nor an insufferable foodie. He just liked to do things properly." Over dinner, he conveys heartfelt details of his life, his creative pursuits and his enchanted marriage, ultimately becoming something of a teacher and protective father figure to Isabel. He offers wisdom and perspective as Isabel shares her adventures working for the New York Post, her crumbling marriage, difficulties in raising her daughter and her return to dating. 

Dinner with Edward emerges as a beautiful, passionate love story--wholly platonic--about two people whose lives are have undergone change, but who learn how to adapt and truly appreciate life again. Isabel Vincent's rich, perfectly paced narrative is served with as much wonder and gratitude as the deliciously conveyed indulgence of each satisfying, lingering meal. 

Dinner with Edward: A Story of Unexpected Friendship by Isabel Vincent
Algonquin Books, $23.99 Hardcover, 9781616204228, 224 pages
Publication Date: May 24, 2016
To order this book on INDIEBOUND, link HERE

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (June 3, 2016), link HERE 

Juliette Fay: Vaudeville and the Culture of Outsiders

The Writer's Life

Photo by Kristen Dacy Iwai

The Tumbling Turner Sisters (read my review below) by Juliette Fay is about a poverty-stricken family and how four sisters form a vaudeville acrobatic act in 1919. Fay's novel was inspired by her great-grandfather, Fred Delorme, who, in order to support his own family, found success in small-time vaudeville shows and revues. Fay is the oldest of three sisters. "We are quite a pack!" she says. "And while none of us is especially like any of the Turner girls, I felt very comfortable writing about the sibling dynamic, and I have my own wonderful sisters to thank for that." Fay's three priorworks of contemporary women's fiction have earned awards and recognition from the Massachusetts Center for the Book, the American Booksellers Association, the American Library Association, Good Housekeeping, Target's Bookmarked Club and Library Journal. 

Why write this book now?

I was coming up blank on ideas for contemporary fiction when I was reminded of my great-grandfather and his vaudeville career. I overcame my reservations and dove in. I always wanted to try historical fiction because I enjoy reading it so much. It's a wonderful way to learn about another time while enjoying the entertainment of a good story. I was hesitant to take it on, though, because I didn't feel "qualified," as if I needed a Ph.D. in some little-known era to be allowed to write about it. Even when I got over that, I was intimidated by the steep learning curve of doing so much research and communicating it in a natural way over the course of the story.

Any major challenges in the writing process?

Two: getting the history right and getting the voices right. There's so much about writing in another time period that's tricky. You don't know how people talked to one another, what phrases or tone they might have used--or not used!--that would be different from today. You don't always know what had been invented. I wanted to write a scene in which the girls were listening to the radio, and I knew radios had been invented, but I had to do more research to learn that there were no public broadcasts until 1920, the year after the story takes place! I felt like with every sentence I wrote, I needed to look something up.

Did anything stand out or surprise you in your research?

Vaudeville itself was a subculture based mostly on merit. If you were talented and successful, your gender, skin color and ethnic origin didn't matter nearly as much. What kept coming back to me was that vaudeville, in many ways, was a culture of outsiders. Middle- and upper-class Americans looked down their noses at performing, which was considered sketchy work. So it was left mainly to the poor, immigrants and minorities, and women--none of whom had many other options to rise above their station in life. It was a way for them to beat the system which, at the time, offered up a pretty heavy slice of oppression.

The vaudeville era spanned from the 1880s to the 1920s. Why did you choose to set the story in 1919?

Socio-politically there was so much going on in 1919--the passage of prohibition and women's suffrage within a matter of months, even as the country was just barely beginning to recover from the deep losses of World War I and the Spanish flu. Everything was changing--except for racism, that remained very entrenched.

I was particularly interested in exploring the choices that the Turners could and couldn't make as women at that time. They could get jobs outside the home, but only certain jobs, for instance as nurses, telephone operators and secretaries. And much of society still considered that second best to being a wife and mother; employment was something you had to endure if you couldn't find a man to marry you. College was a complete long shot, even for young women from wealthy families. And yet the concept of the New Woman--smart, adventurous, unmarried--was gaining ground. I loved being able to tell a story about four individual young women who were coming of age at the same time America was coming of age.

This novel is the first book you've ever written using a first-person perspective.

After having written in third person (my own "voice") for three previous novels, it was quite a challenge to constantly have to think about how a character would say something, whether she would or wouldn't notice something, what her thoughts might be on a subject.

The story is told from the middle sisters' points of view. Why share only two perspectives?

My original intention was to tell the story from one point of view--17-year-old Winnie's--and I wrote the entire first draft in her voice. But then it became clear there were interesting things happening with the other sisters that I couldn't talk about because Winnie didn't know about them. I considered Kit (the youngest) and Nell (the oldest), but ultimately it was Gert who had the most secrets, and only she could bring them into full view. So I added chapters from Gert and rewrote some of Winnie's chapters in Gert's voice.

The supporting cast--beyond the family dynamic--is rich and colorful.

Yes, many of the secondary characters stand for something important--both in terms of the story and in terms of history.

As an African-American, Tippety Tap Jones is not only tapping across the stage, he's tap dancing his way around the landmines of racism. He traverses the fine line between deference (for his own survival) and not being pushed around. His refusal to "black up" becomes a sort of rallying call for the girls, and emboldens them to live on their own terms a little more, even though as women, they are rarely allowed such control.

Nat and Benny, the Jewish comedy pair, are also stand-ins. The more I researched vaudeville, the more I saw how immigrants and children of immigrants flooded to vaudeville because it was one of the few ways they might get ahead in the new world. Jewish humor was all over vaudeville, from Weber and Fields to Smith and Dale to the Marx Brothers. The humor of Nat and Benny endears them to the girls, and so does their avuncular kindness. They teach the girls many lessons about entertainment and about life.

Acrobatics play a major role in the story. Do you have any personal background in this?

Absolutely none. This became evident when my editor, a former gymnast, told me quite bluntly that the girls would never have been able to learn all those stunts in a couple of months. She really made me work at making the skill acquisition more believable, for which I'm very grateful. Otherwise I'd be getting scoffing reviews from gymnasts by the dozens.

What would you like readers to take away from this novel?

I hope that readers will love the story of these four girls. Then I hope they'll consider the conditions and constraints the sisters had to deal with--that all of these "outsiders" had to deal with. While we've come so far from those days, to varying degrees and in different forms, some of those conditions and constraints still exist. I hope The Tumbling Turner Sisters will spark some conversations and deeper understanding about that.

Is there another historical novel in your future?

Yes, I've just started a story set during the silent movie era of the early 1920s. Hollywood was becoming a mecca for film production and it was a pretty crazy place, so I'm having a lot of fun! 

Note: This interview is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this Q&A as originally published on Shelf Awareness (6/24/16), click HERE

The Tumbling Turner Sisters

Four sisters launch a vaudeville act to rescue their working-class family when it falls on hard times.  

The vaudeville era is authentically brought back to life in The Tumbling Turner Sisters by Juliette Fay (The Shortest Way Home). The story follows the plight of a hardworking, near-poverty-level family in Johnson City, N.Y., in 1919 after the patriarch, Frank, a lowly shoemaker, has his hand crushed when he tries to break up a barroom brawl. With Frank unable to work and bills piling up, determined mother Ethel, who'd always craved stardom, seeks to remedy the family's misfortune by recruiting her four daughters (ages 13 to 22) into forming a sister act of vaudeville tumblers.

The story is told from the perspectives of the middle sisters: Winnie, who wants to go to college and become a doctor, and Gert, no-nonsense and curvy-figured, who longs for a better life than her mother's. Rounding out the quartet are Kit, the youngest and tallest of the bunch, and Nell, the oldest, a young mother and recent widow. It doesn't take long for the sisters to attract the attention of an agent, who launches them on a tour through upstate New York, where they encounter a host of colorful performers including a Yiddish comedy duo, an African American tap dancer, Italian immigrant musicians and temperamental animal handlers. 

As the girls and their mother become immersed in the grueling vaudeville circuit, their mettle is tested. They are forced to discover who they are and the realities of life amid romantic attractions, con men and issues of women's rights and racial discrimination. Fay's historical novel probes the personal lives and questions of the era with adventure and aplomb.

The Tumbling Turner Sisters by Juliette Fay

Gallery Books, $24.00 Hardcover, 9781501134470, 352 pages

Publication Date: June 14, 2016

To order this book on INDIEBOUND, click HERE

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (June 24, 2016 ), link HERE

Romance is My Day Job: A Memoir of Finding Love at Last

Patience Bloom, a successful editor for Harlequin Books, chronicles her search for love in Romance Is My Day Job. The memoir commences in 1984 at a high school dance, when bookish wallflower, Patience, a sophomore, is ditched by Ken, her good-looking, 'Harlequin-hero'-like date. Sam, a popular, fun-loving senior rescued Patience, the two of them taking to the dance floor and even posing as a couple for the event photographer. 

The picture is all that remained from the thrill of that night. For the next 25 years, Patience endured a series of bad relationships as she moved around the U.S., lived in Paris and finally landed in New York at Harlequin. By the time she turned 40, Patience—professionally successful, but still single—concluded, "My life is nothing like these books, not even a little bit."

References to popular romance books and movies infuse Bloom's honest, witty narrative as she offers a clever, humorous take on hero archetypes and compares lessons learned, often the hard way, from her own romantic entanglements. When Sam contacts Patience via Facebook shortly after her 41st birthday, the two, living on different continents, court each other via Skype for four months. They share an intimacy that affirms Patience's faith in love, encouraging her to reflect upon her life and open her heart. But is Sam too good to be true? Once they finally meet again, face to face, will they be compatible? Suspense deepens as Bloom's beautifully rendered love story illustrates how real life can often be as engrossing as romance novels.

Romance is My Day Job: A Memoir of Finding Love at Last by Patience Bloom

Dutton Adult,  $26.95 hardcover, 9780525954385, 320 pp

Publication Date: February 6, 2014

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (2/14/14), click HERE

Ask Bob

Peter Gethers' popular memoirs about his beloved cat, Norton, put his name on the literary map. In Ask Bob: A Novel, Gethers tackles fiction, telling the story of Dr. Robert Heller, a prominent New York City veterinarian who also authors a newspaper column called, "Ask Dr. Bob," which addresses the concerns and woes of pet owners. Dr. Bob is no-nonsense in the delivery and approach of his column--and with his patients and their owners--but he's not as direct in his personal life. He comes from a dysfunctional family that has made his role as son, brother, uncle and lover a muddled, thorny challenge. When Bob meets and falls in love with a woman whose family has more issues than his, he takes solace in their romance and the security of his job, concluding that he understands animals better than people. But when tragedy strikes, Bob is forced to step beyond his comfort zone and tend to the people he loves and cares for the most.

Gethers has written a smart, lively novel infused with romance and heartfelt, real-life complications of family and domesticity. The book centers upon the women in Dr. Bob's life who influence him the most during an eighteen-year period from when Bob is 24 years old until he turns 42. The interspersed addition of several of Dr. Bob's newspaper columns and his charming, insightful notes about certain clients and important people in his life add levity and humor to some heavier aspects and themes.

Ask Bob: A Novel by Peter Gethers

Henry Holt and Co., $24.00, Hardcover,  9780805093315, 320 pp

Publication Date: August 6, 2013

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (8/9/13), click HERE

The Widow Waltz

It's not often that a main character in a novel of general literary fiction dies in the first chapter, but that's exactly how Sally Koslow constructs The Widow Waltz. The story opens via the point of view of Ben Silver, a charming, middle-aged, seemingly successful Manhattan lawyer who goes for a run in Central Park only to suffer a massive heart attack. His sudden death comes as a complete shock to those who love him - most especially, his devoted wife, Georgia Waltz. What's even more troubling and upsetting is the news that he has left his well-to-do family practically insolvent. Financial ruin and debt now fall to his widow and their two adult daughters who had been living, thanks to Ben, an upscale, privileged existence. Ben's death might make him physically absent from the lives of his loved ones, but his presence becomes more palpable as the trio slowly begins to uncover reasons why the family's fortune might've evaporated. Was Ben the man they thought he was? Was he harboring secrets? As Georgia and the girls reinvent their lives by selling off assets and scrambling to find work to support themselves, unforeseen circumstances, people and impulses--some romantic--alter their plans in unpredictable ways.

Koslow (The Late, Lamented Molly Marx) is a skillful, meticulous writer attuned to the absurdities of life, death and the multi-generational bonds of family. Pitch-perfect details and alternating narrative voices allow her to fully explore the emotional intricacies of these richly woven characters in crisis.

The Widow Waltz by Sally Koslow

Viking Adult, $27.95 Hardcover, 9780670025640, 352 pp

Publication Date: June 13, 2013

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Note:  This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (6/25/13), click HERE

The Ghost Horse

In The Ghost Horse: A True Story of Love, Death and Redemption, Joe Layden (The Last Great Fight) has crafted an inspiring love story infused with fate and coincidence, second chances and hope.

Tim Snyder was a gruff, nomadic horseman who fled hardscrabble beginnings to train "cheap horses." While working in a second-tier horse barn in upstate New York, a runaway colt in his care knocked over his quiet, unassuming coworker, Lisa Calley, with whom he became instantly smitten--and vice-versa. Lisa, ten years younger than Tim, had already survived a broken marriage, cancer and a traumatic brain injury from a previous horse riding incident. Their shared passion for horses united them as they built a married life together; her emotional sensitivity ultimately softened his unsentimental rough edges.

When Lisa's cancer returned, she promised Tim, "I'll see you again. I'm coming back as a horse." Her death left a gaping hole in her husband until, years later, he scraped together enough money to purchase a filly whose winning pedigree was offset by a sightless left eye and congenital abnormalities in her left foot and shoulders. No one but Tim believed she would ever make it to the starting gate. But "Lisa's Booby Trap," as Tim named her, took the racing world by storm, and their bond helped Tim rebound from grief and loneliness. He came to believe the filly's personality reflected the sweet, resilient disposition of his late wife.

Layden has teamed up with a variety of superstars to co-write many books, from Kobe Bryant of the NBA to heavy metal superstar, Dave Mustaine. In The Ghost Horse, Layden's writing shines on its own - insight and compassion weaving the narrative threads of this dual love story that transcends the boundaries of life and death. 

The Ghost Horse: A True Story of Love, Death and Redemption by Joe Layden

St. Martin's Press, $24.99 Hardcover, 9780312643324, 256 pp

Publication Date: May 7, 2013

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Note:  This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (5/21/13), click HERE