Cannonball Read 12

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Another good outing for Atkinson

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

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This second installment in Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie detective series begins with Jackson witnessing a road rage incident at the Edinburgh festival, and from there Atkinson spins out into chapters focusing individually on Jackson and other supporting characters: Martin, a mild-mannered mystery writer; Gloria, the wife of an aging mobster; and Louise, a policewoman who keeps crossing paths with Jackson.  As with Atkinson’s other Jackson Brodie novels, the threads for all these characters eventually wind together in a satisfying way. Although I found this 2nd novel […]

A Serviceable Mystery

Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

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I love a good mystery. I can tear through an absorbing mystery in a day, but I slow down for certain mysteries because of the depth of the characters.  While Case Histories moves at a decent clip, the characters are sketched with more mannerisms and exposition than depth. To her credit, though, author Kate Atkinson is quite good at portraying the many forms of grief and loss. While I did not find this mystery very satisfying in the end, I do appreciate the effort that went in […]

(not exactly) The Prime of Mr. Jackson Brodie

Big Sky by Kate Atkinson

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It’s been nine years since we’ve last seen Jackson Brodie, and in those nine years a lot has changed. So much has changed that I found myself lost a few times- am I supposed to remember this? Is that name supposed to mean something? Is this kid important? Jackson seemed a bit adrift at times as well, but I suppose that was more intentional than my foggy memory. The world has changed for Jackson. His career, his family, his car, his dog- it’s all changing. […]

British Mysteries

Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

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As I’ve said several times in these parts, I’m a bigger fan of the “whydunnit” than the “whodunnit.” The big reveal of the killer has never appealed much to me. I like to know what makes one person want to take the life of another. Murder is dismissed as a regular crime in fiction because of the prevalence of mystery novels but being an empathetic person, I need to have some sort of understanding as to the motivations of the players. My love of the […]

When all else failed, the mundane remained

Transcription by Kate Atkinson

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I stumbled upon Life After Life by Kate Atkinson after some favorable Cannonball reviews, and I really liked it. So when I saw that Atkinson had a new book out, Transcription (2018), I immediately put a hold on it at the library. Like the other books I’ve read by Atkinson, most of the events of this book take place in and around WWII. This story is split into two time frames. The first is during the war, where our protagonist, Juliet Armstrong, works as a typist for MI5. […]



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