The Best Book I Read This Month: Death Washes Ashore by Patricia Skalka

The best book I read this month was a short but engaging mystery: Death Washes Ashore by Patricia Skalka. The book is the most recent installment in Skalka’s Dave Cubiak Door County Mysteries series, which I enjoy very much. (My favorite of the series is still Death in Cold Water.)

Death Washes Ashore takes place in the wake of a destructive storm. A strangely-dressed, strangley-positioned body is found on a beach, and Sheriff Dave Cubiak’s team quickly determines the death was not accidental. Over the course of the investigation, Cubiak is drawn not only into the world of larping (live action role playing), but also into a mess of secrets and lies and betrayals.

I enjoy the regular characters in this series. They’re all very down to earth folks. And this story is a well-plotted mystery. I enjoyed all the twists and turns—and the opportunity to visit Door County again, albeit vicariously.

The Best Book I Read This Month: West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge

The best book I read this month was an unexpected delight. Lynda Rutledge’s West with Giraffes is a fictional account of the cross-country journey of the San Diego Zoo’s first two giraffes. I was looking for something light(er) to read after finishing a particularly intense mystery (The Broken Girls by Simone St. James, in case you’re interested in that sort of thing). West with Giraffes fit the bill perfectly.

Set primarily during the Great Depression, with a frame story set in the very near future, Rutledge’s book follows the adventures of Woodrow Wilson Nickel. Displaced by the Dust Bowl, young Nickel is looking for his place in the world when he stumbles across two giraffes being offloaded from a ship that survived a hurricane at sea. Nickel is captivated. When he hears that they are being sent to San Diego, he decides he must go with them, that his destiny lies in California. What follows is part mad-cap chase, part buddy road trip, part coming of age, and entirely full of heart.

The story is narrated by Nickel, who is 105 years old in the frame story. He’s just heard that giraffes are about to become extinct and he’s desperate to tell the story of the two giraffes that changed his life.

Nickel’s voice is colorful and conversational, which made the book an easy, enjoyable read. I may have even laughed out loud in some places. If you’re interested in a light, fun read, this could be just what you’re looking for.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Horseman by Christina Henry

It’s spooky season, so it’s fitting that the best book I read this month had a spooky bent. Horseman by Christina Henry is not so much a retelling of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow as it is an imaginative sequel. I adored Henry’s Alice in Wonderland retellings, and this one didn’t disappoint, either.

The story follows Ben Van Brunt, grandchild of the original Legend’s Brom Van Brunt and Katrina Van Tassel. Ben wants nothing more than to be just like brave, bombastic Grandpa Brom, but that determination is put to the test when two village children turn up dead and mutilated. Ben knows a monster killed the boys, but Sleepy Hollow’s residents want something human to blame—something like Ben.

Henry has crafted a story in which nothing is quite what it looks like—not Ben, not the murderous monster, not even the legendary horseman. I loved that. And while I can’t imagine a sequel to this book, I would happily read anything else set in this world.

The Best Book I Read This Month: The Secrets We Kept by Laura Prescott

The best book I read this month was a spy story, but one that had far more depth and nuance than any James Bond tale. Laura Prescott’s The Secrets We Kept tells the story of the novel Doctor Zhivago but from the perspectives of women: Pasternak’s mistress tells the story of its publication and women who work at the CIA as typists and spies tell the story of how it was smuggled back into the Soviet Union.

In these stories, we get a sense of life on both sides of the Cold War during the 1950s. The lives of Irina and Sally in the United States feel like technicolor compared to that of Olga in the Soviet Union, and I found the story of Irina and Sally’s friendship the most compelling part of the book.

I admit there were times I wasn’t sure at first who was narrating a particular chapter, even with the clues in the chapter titles, but I found the story engaging and I especially appreciated the female perspective on what has traditionally been a male genre.