The Mansion of Happiness

The Mansion of Happiness (2012) by Jill Lepore. What exactly Lepore was trying to accomplish with this book I was never completely sure of. It's subtitled "A History of Life and Death," and the author systematically traces each of the stages of life, from egg to death, throughout American history, in succeeding chapters of this book. It's a very scholarly work, which I felt worked somewhat against it. It's too scholarly. The book would have been more enjoyable for me if it had been a little more popularized. But then, maybe that's just my laziness of mind at work. It's a good book, but I didn't look forward eagerly to getting back to it each time I read it. There are treasures buried here, but they're a bit hard to get to. Grade: B

The Red House

The Red House (2012) by Mark Haddon. A fascinating and penetrating look at a large, dysfunctional family made up of a brother and sister and their spouses and children. The whole clan gets together for a joint vacation in a house ("the red house") in Scotland, and gradually, as they interact, secrets and long-forgotten hurts come to the fore. I found this book a bit hard to follow the first time through. There is a large number of characters, and each is introduced just once -- if you don't catch it the first time, you are lost. But I found that after finishing the book, I was able to start at the beginning again and be completely at home. Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and A Spot of Bother, is a masterful writer and his books draw the reader in and keep them involved. This is a really good book. Grade: B+ 

Beautiful Ruins

Beautiful Ruins (2012) by Jess Walter. The story begins in 1962, when Pasquale Tursi, a young Italian, catches his first glimpse of Dee Moray, an American actress who is in Italy for the filming of "Cleopatra." He is immediately and forever captivated. Dee Moray, real name Debra Moore, thinks she is dying. She comes to Tursi's Hotel Adequate View because she has been sent there by the evil Michael Deane, who is trying to get the movie Cleopatra produced and doesn't want to burden Richard Burton with the fact that he has gotten Dee Moray pregnant. This is just the framework for the novel, a beautifully written and conceived work about lost love and the movie business. The book jumps around in time, from 1962 to the present, but never loses the reader. I found it to be a most enjoyable read. Grade: A-

The Innocents

The Innocents (2012) by Francesca Segal. Adam and Rachel have been an exclusive couple since they were sixteen years old, and now, at last, they are engaged to be married. Everything is going smoothly until Rachel's scandalous cousin, Ellie, comes to London from New York. There, she has been a "kept woman," but Adam can't help himself -- he falls deeply, lustfully in love with her. As he plots how he will tell Rachel and her family that he can't marry her, and later that he must leave her, he doesn't realize that Rachel and her family know about him and Ellie, and that they have ways of gently, powerfully making him stay. Although I couldn't share Adam's passion for Ellie, I could identify with his feelings of being trapped and being in love with someone else. This is a well written and highly involving book which makes for very entertaining reading. Grade: B+

The Chaperone

The Chaperone (2012) by Laura Moriarty. In 1922, a 15-year-old Louise Brooks, escorted by Cora Carlisle, 36, sets out from Wichita to journey to New York City to enroll in a dance school. Louise has her sights set on a show business career, and she will succeed. Cora has her own reasons for going to New York, and her own life will take off in new directions after the trip. One thing about this book that really captivates the reader is that Louise Brooks is a real person -- she was a silent-film star in the 1920s and even made films into the '30s, until her career flamed out. Books have been written about her, and she even wrote a memoir called Lulu in Hollywood. Another thing about the book that is arresting is the story of Cora, unexpectedly colorful and full of strange events that one would never imagine happening in the 1920s. Cora's story, of course, is fiction, but it meshes seamlessly with Louise's true story; taken together, they make for fascinating reading. This novel is highly recommended. Grade: A 

The Right-Hand Shore

The Right-Hand Shore (2012) by Christopher Tilghman. The Mason family estate, the Retreat, is the central character in this exploration of the place in American history of race relations. In the novel, perhaps the main human characters are Thomas and Beal, a white boy and a black girl who grow up together and fall in love. Their love is, of course, forbidden, and much of the book is taken up with the sturm und drang of the figuring out of what can be done about them. Of course to the reader it is obvious that they must be together, and to be together they must flee, and that's what eventually comes about. I felt the book was a good read, and there was much in it of interest, so perhaps other readers will enjoy it. I found it to be a quality book that was not much fun to read. Grade: B

This is Your Captain Speaking

This is Your Captain Speaking (2012) by Jon Methven. An airplane takes off, then suffers engine failure. The captain, Hank Swagger, manages to land the plane on the Hudson River and save all the passengers, thus becoming a hero. But all is not as it seems. It turns out that the crash was engineered by the airline as a stunt to pump up its stock price, which has been in a slump. A variety of weird characters become involved in the plot and the cover up, all interacting in funny ways up until the ultimate shoot-out. To some people this will be a very funny book; but to me, it was mostly just stupid. It's certainly well written, and all the parts fit together in interesting ways. But I didn't especially look forward to reading it again after I had put it down for a while, and I never laughed. You may find this a highly entertaining book. I didn't. Grade: B-