The Rabbit's Paw Book Reviews

  Parties and poisons, oh, my! I had to pick up this novel, with a title like that. Something ghastly is going on in the botany department at the University College of London, and it is 1923.  The protagonist of this story is Saffron Everleigh, the only female research assistant at the college, and it goes without saying that this was a hard road in 1923. One evening, at a dinner party, a professor’s wife is poisoned, and Saffron is a witness. When her elderly boss, Dr. Maxwell, is accused of and arrested for this poisoning, Saffron is determined to find out what really happened, and to clear the name of a man who has been very dear to her.  Meanwhile, the botany department is preparing for an important expedition to the Amazon, and Saffron must assist another scientist, Alexander Ashton, in his preparations for the trip. Gradually, she finds a friend and confidant in Alexander, and persuades him to help her piece together the mystery of the poisoning of Dr. Henry’s wife...

Here is a novel with a very interesting premise: what if it were suddenly impossible, the world over, to commit physical violence against another person? For instance, bullets from guns just hang in the air, bombs might damage property, but do no one , and people are unable to strike others.  What would people do?  We know enough about human behavior, especially through social media, to expect that some folks would start performing some dangerous experiments. Those who are filled with hate would surely try to find other ways to affect pain and hardship on others.  In The Damage Done, author Michael Landweber presents this interesting premise, along with well drawn characters I found to be either likable or intriguing. This is well-written,  with good pacing, and I enjoyed it.  My one reservation about this slim novel is that it just skims the surface of its topic. This may be as intended, however, since this does create food for thought. Would there be a period ...

  This is one  woman’s story, written to her grandson. Violeta Del Valle has lived one hundred years, from the year of the Spanish Flu pandemic, to the current age of the Coronavirus. This is not just her history, but also a hundred years of her country’s history, as it impacted her and her family. Her home is a country in South America, but not otherwise specified.  As a little girl, Violeta is raised in an affluent family, but soon, the convergence of The Great Depression and her father’s business practices equal disaster for her family. This is the first upheaval in her eventful life. She will learn to live and survive in multiple ways and face many challenges. Some of these challenges will be strictly personal, while the most dangerous will involve the political landscape in her country.  This narrative made me very thankful to have grown up in a country where attention to politics seems to be optional. That is, we in The United States have never woken up to find...

  This is not only a fascinating biography of Polly Adler, but also an insightful history of the Jazz Age. Polly Adler was once one of many young immigrants to come from Eastern Europe, but the path her life took was anything but expected. Born in Yanow, Russia, in 1900, Pearl Adler's early life was very circumspect due to her gender and the anti-Semitic restrictions of the Russian Empire. Nevertheless, throughout her childhood, Pearl exhibited intelligence and was determined to get an education, even though that was unheard of for a girl. At just thirteen years of age, she landed at Ellis Island, all alone, to meet relations who were strangers. When this arrangement turned out to be less than desirable, she was forced to live on her own at a very young age. Her intelligence and determination would be put to many a test in the coming years. How Pearl became Polly Adler, the most well-known madam and a legend in New York City, is a long story, and very much worth reading. Boxers, ga...

  The Supper Club Murders, by Victoria Dowd, is a zany, tongue-in-cheek murder mystery.  Writing comedy is a difficult thing to do, and since this novel is set in England, it is possible that some of the humor washed over my American head. There were some funny moments, though, and a few times I thought that the dialogue might be funnier if it were acted out.  Since I hadn't read the first books, and did not know the Smart women, I had to learn certain things about their characters along the way. Pandora and her daughter Ursula Smart are a couple of women who are so strange, I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to invite them anywhere. However, the rest of the characters at this dinner party were even stranger, some of them downright mean, creepy, insane, or all three. In short, I did not care what happened to any of them. These people don't even enjoy each other. As this dinner party progresses, we meet the joyless villagers, and hear their resentments and bickering. Some o...

  The Book of Magic , Alice Hoffman's conclusion to the Owens family saga, is populated with the family members we know and look forward to meeting again, in another fascinating adventure. We witness Franny and Jet's last day together, which reads like an emotional tribute to their past lives, and all that they've shared. Meanwhile, the lives of Sally and Gillian, the nieces they've raised, are examined and contrasted. Finally, we get a look into the lives of Franny and Jet's granddaughters, Antonia and Kylie. And yes, Vincent makes another appearance. In the early part of this book, Kylie's story is the most prominent, because she is in love--and afraid of the family curse, which her mother Sally will not talk to her about. Actually, Sally has hidden everything to do with magic from her daughter.  It is Kylie's actions that set the main plot moving, and I thought this took a bit too long. When she starts to explore the origins of the curse in England, the a...

  Note: This book has been left out! I read this novel back in February, and forgot to include it in my Netgalley  reviews. So, here it is. This story is set in the late 1970's and is the story of how Cassie Lyman, a graduate student, navigates a critical time in her life. She is developing a research subject for her doctoral thesis in women's history, when she comes across a fascinating amount of information at Smith College about Kate Easton, a woman who founded the Birth Control League of Massachusetts in 1916. Cassie also discovers that she is actually related to Kate Easton. At this point, Cassie has been living in Minnesota, but she has returned to her childhood stomping grounds for the wedding of her sister. So, in the foreground of this story is Cassie's current family drama surrounding the wedding and-- other later developments. Meanwhile, Cassie is obsessed with reading Kate Easton's journal entries and letters. As time goes on, Cassie finds parallels between ...