The Amazing Adventures of Aaron Broom

This book is short but very entertaining. It takes place pre-WWII, during the Great Depression. All the banks have closed their doors, and everyone's out of work. 

Aaron Broom, age 12, came from a wealthy family who lost everything. His father becomes a Bulova watch traveling salesman, who is in the wrong place at the wrong time when a robbery at J & J Jewelers goes wrong. He is arrested for shooting one of the jewelers. Aaron sees the police bring his father out of the store in handcuffs. Aaron knows his father is innocent and sets out to find the real shooter with the help of a new found friend, Augie. They trail all the workers of the shop, break into apartments, and do fake interviews.   And with the help of a lawyer picked out of the phone book, they are able to free Aaron's father.

One thing for sure, Aaron, is an honest young boy. When finding a wallet containing $75 in the gutter, he knows that the right thing to do is return it to the rightful owner.  Friend Augie is against this, claiming it could be food in their bellies and a place to live for a while. Aaron replies, "I'm no Boy Scout--if it's life-or-death medicine that's one thing. But when it's to steal...  If you return the wallet with the money in it, then your soul will be okay.  It's the one thing the Depression can't take from us long as we take care of it. I have this thing about my soul, that it's a good part of me, that it can keep me going or leave me empty."

I'll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara

I’ll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara is a posthumously published work from the editor of truecrimediary.com in which she recounts her years-long search to uncover the identity of the Golden State Killer. For more than a decade, the GSK terrorized neighborhoods and towns across Northern California, attacking single woman and couples in their homes. Despite countless clues found at each crime scene, the police were never able to find a viable suspect for the crimes. After the discovery of DNA profiling, evidence from seemingly unrelated cases was found to be linked through DNA evidence, but the killer still couldn’t be caught. The GSK went dormant in 1986, but no one could conclusively say if he had died, been imprisoned, or was still out there alluding capture.

It has been said that McNamara’s blog and articles about the GSK prevented the GSK cases from going completely cold, keeping the public and the police constantly vigilant for any clue that might lead to the perpetrator of these horrendous crimes. McNamara tracked down clues through thousands of pages of police records and court filings, interviews with police officers who first investigated and their colleagues now working the cases, and even went so far as to track down a pair of distinctive cufflinks that might have been stolen by the GSK. This preoccupation took a toll on McNamara’s life, however, intensifying her insomnia and anxiety and possibly contributing to her untimely death. According to her husband, an undiagnosed heart condition was exacerbated by prescription pain and anti-anxiety medication; McNamara died in 2016, just two years before the killer was finally brought to justice. In April 2018, just months after her book was published, police finally arrested a suspect found through tracking DNA evidence. While the story of the search for this heartless killer is a fascinating one, what makes I’ll Be Gone in the Dark really stand out from other true crime books is McNamara’s ability to humanize both the victims and the professional and armchair investigators who dedicated their lives to seeking justice. 

-Portia

Once a Scoundrel by Mary Jo Putney

Gabriel Hawkins Vance entered the Royal Navy at the age of twelve and faced many horrific circumstances. At the age of sixteen, he commanded a French prize ship, but when Gabriel had to face his grandfather, Admiral Vance, he felt terrified. He would rather face disease, cannonballs, and ruthless pirates.

Gabriel resigns from the Royal Navy, walking out the door to an unknown future. All he knew was ships and the sea, so he decided to be the commander of his own ship. He could sail wherever, whenever he wanted, and take only the jobs he felt like taking, with the larger the risk the higher the payout.

One of these high-risk jobs is to save a lady who has been captured by pirates along the Barbary states. His mission: negotiate the ransom of fifty thousand pounds and bring her back to England unharmed. (Fifty thousand pounds in 1814 is like $940,000 in today's currency--a kings fortune!)

This "lady" who needs saving is not the average, sweet, curtsying sort. Aurora "Roaring Rory" Lawrence has a reputation for being intelligent, beautiful, charming, and independent--which is what got her in trouble in the first place. The story focuses on the twists, turns, and risks that Gabriel takes to rescue Aurora, her cousin, and the entire crew. With romance, murder, bribes, bartering, harems, and a wicked sheik, Once a Scoundrel is hard to put down. Although it is part of a series, it can certainly stand alone.

She lifted her chin. "Should I go free and others spend the rest of their lives in slavery because of the lucky accident of my birth?"

"In the eyes of God, no, but it's the way of the world in which we live." 

~Once a Scoundrel

~Daniela Green

Doc by Mary Doria Russell

I do not read westerns. When I picked up Doc by Mary Doria Russell, I had my doubts that it was my type of book. What I found was a historical fiction title with real characters interacting with made up characters solving a murder and trying their best to make a living in the town of Dodge City, Kansas.

What I thought I knew about Doc Holliday was no more than the typical legends of the OK Corral. This book goes into the story of Doc before the famous gun fight. It tells of the Southern gentleman, the piano player, the dentist, the gambler, the man with tuberculosis and the good friend. During one particularly big fight with his mistress / girlfriend / favorite prostitute, Kate, he explains why he is a dentist in the town of Dodge when it doesn't bring in any money. He says he does it because it makes life better for other people. He takes away some suffering for others by helping them escape pain. Doc spends his days as a dentist in town and his nights gambling. 

This book is seasoned with many colorful characters including the Earp brothers, a number of women who work at the brothel owned by James Earp, and perhaps one of my favorite characters a man who was a prince in Austria but left to become a priest on the prairie, "For the rest of his long and eventful life, Alexander von Angensperg might have topped just about any war story told in a Jesuit residence. He could have listened, and nodded, and acknowledged each man's most colorful adventure, and then achieved an awed, respectful silence with just six words: "I heard confession in Dodge City." 

Dodge City was a rough and tumble place and the team of Masterson and the Earps tried to bring law and order to the town the best they could.  At the end of the book Doc Holliday, the Earps, and their ladies are heading off to Tombstone to see what the newly developed mining town has to offer. 

This was an enjoyable title that once I got into I couldn't wait to see what was next in the adventures of Doc, the Earps and Kate in the city of Dodge. 

Shannon 

The Things They Carried

The New York Times blurb on the front of the reissued paperback of Tim O'Brien's classic book about the Vietnam War reads, "A marvel of storytelling...a vital, important book--a book that matters not only to the reader interested in Vietnam, but to anyone interested in the craft of writing as well." O'Brien has told his own war story in fictionalized form, in a series of interconnected short pieces. It is brilliant. He says at one point, "If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted ... you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie." Many authors have written of their war experiences, whether it be in WWII, Vietnam, or the more modern battlegrounds of Iraq and Afghanistan. Very few of those have the ability to capture the nuances and make you feel the story deeply in the pit of your stomach. O'Brien has that talent. In a tender balancing act, he writes of the beauty of the jungle, the exhilaration of camaraderie, while also recording the brutality of war. O'Brien was not confident that our country should be at war in Vietnam, and when drafted, he toyed with the idea of running for the Canadian border from his home in Minnesota. He struggled deeply, thinking that running would be the bravest thing he could do. Instead, he says what drove him to report for duty as ordered was "hot, stupid shame." He feared exile more than he feared war. The bravest thing, in the end, was observing, participating in, and recording the mundane and the misery of being a soldier in that time and place. Highly recommended.

Kelly Currie