The Books I'm Reading Now
I'm reading Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead, the second in Elle Cosimano's playful Finlay Donovan mystery series; I'm reading Quantum Girl Theory, a recent gothic mystery about a finder of missing girls from Erin Kate Ryan; and I'm listening to Dawnie Wilton's fictional musical history, The Final Revival of Opal & Nev.
What are you reading and enjoying these days, bookworms?
01 Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
In Elle Cosimano's first book in this series, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It, we meet main protagonist Finlay Donovan: an author and a recently single mom, divorced from a cheating man who's easy to detest. She's struggling both emotionally and financially as she tries to support her two young children.
Various misunderstandings during a publishing meeting about Finlay's upcoming mystery novel result in her receipt of a mysterious note implying that Finlay is involved in something sinister--and offering her an actual hit job. Cosimano struck a campy, playful tone in that book and offered a quirky setup for Finlay's complicated situation.
In this second book, Finlay has Vero in her confidences as her live-in nanny. When the women are tipped off by their accidental underworld contacts that there's a hit out on Finlay's obnoxious ex-husband, they must decide whether to save him and how.
Click here for my review of Finlay Donovan Is Killing It.
02 Quantum Girl Theory by Erin Kate Ryan
In Erin Kate Ryan's recent gothic mystery Quantum Girl Theory, Mary Garrett focuses on finding missing girls, and she keeps her own past, her secrets, and her emotions about all of it penned up tightly.
When she arrives in the Jim Crow South to investigate a girl who has disappeared, she finds that two other girls went missing as well, but local law enforcement hasn't put resources into finding them. Those two girls are Black.
As Mary's search for all three girls intensifies, we find that Mary herself was a "missing girl," Paula Jean Welden, who vanished one night in 1946. Ryan explores various alternate histories and life tracks for Paula Jean while "Mary" digs more deeply into the circumstances surrounding the modern-day disappearances of the Southern girls.
I received a prepublication digital galley of this book courtesy of NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group.
03 The Final Revival of Opal & Nev by Dawnie Walton
The Final Revival of Opal & Nev is a fictional account of an interracial music duo's rise to success--and their famous split.
Music journalist S. Sunny Shelton shapes an oral history of her two idols, tracing their family lives, youthful experiences, how they met each other, their creative expression, and the passion that ignited a passionate cult following for the duo and their music--until Opal's taking a stand for her beliefs ended their music partnership in dramatic fashion.
As Opal considers reconciling with Nev for a reunion performance, truths from the past come to light and threaten to upend any hope of getting the two musical talents back together.
I'm listening to The Final Revival of Opal & Nev as an audiobook.