Hey hey! Welcome back to Get Rec’d!
This is where I discuss all sorts of book recommendations I’ve given out, overheard, or received in my many bookish communities. There’s some non-fiction, two very different mysteries, and a rec that I overheard a friend giving to someone else. I’m not above eavesdropping on a handsell!
What have you been recommended lately? Or feel free to pass along any recs in the comments!
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The Bangalore Detectives Club
For anyone looking for their next cozy-ish historical mystery series, this is worth a peek!
The first in a charming, joyful cozy crime series set in 1920s Bangalore, featuring sari-wearing detective Kaveri and her husband Ramu. Perfect for fans of Alexander McCall Smith’s The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency.
When clever, headstrong Kaveri moves to Bangalore to marry handsome young doctor Ramu, she’s resigned herself to a quiet life.
But that all changes the night of the party at the Century Club, where she escapes to the garden for some peace and quiet—and instead spots an uninvited guest in the shadows. Half an hour later, the party turns into a murder scene.
When a vulnerable woman is connected to the crime, Kaveri becomes determined to save her and launches a private investigation to find the killer, tracing his steps from an illustrious brothel to an Englishman’s mansion. She soon finds that sleuthing in a sari isn’t as hard as it seems when you have a talent for mathematics, a head for logic, and a doctor for a husband . . .
And she’s going to need them all as the case leads her deeper into a hotbed of danger, sedition, and intrigue in Bangalore’s darkest alleyways.
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Drunk on All Your Strange New Words
I’m tempted to make this one of my staff picks for October! It’s a bit of locked room mystery set in a futuristic New York City with a translator at the heart of it all.
Lydia works as translator for the Logi cultural attaché to Earth. They work well together, even if the act of translating his thoughts into English makes her somewhat wobbly on her feet.
She’s not the agency’s best translator, but what else is she going to do? She has no qualifications, and no discernible talent in any other field.
So when tragedy strikes, and Lydia finds herself at the center of an intergalactic incident, her future employment prospects look dire—that is, if she can keep herself out of jail!
But Lydia soon discovers that help can appear from the most unexpected source…
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We also may use affiliate links in our posts, as well. Thanks!Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson
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Rogues
I’ve recommend Patrick Radden Keefe before and he’s one of my go-to “dad book” authors. His latest is a bit lighter than my previously recommended Empire of Pain and feels more like an anthology of true crime stories.
From the prize-winning, New York Times bestselling author of Say Nothing and Empire of Pain, twelve enthralling stories of skulduggery and intrigue by one of the most decorated journalists of our time.
Patrick Radden Keefe has garnered prizes ranging from the National Magazine Award to the Orwell Prize to the National Book Critics Circle Award for his meticulously reported, hypnotically engaging work on the many ways people behave badly. Rogues brings together a dozen of his most celebrated articles from The New Yorker. As Keefe says in his preface, “They reflect on some of my abiding preoccupations: crime and corruption, secrets and lies, the permeable membrane separating licit and illicit worlds, the bonds of family, the power of denial.”
Keefe brilliantly explores the intricacies of forging $150,000 vintage wines, examines whether a whistleblower who dared to expose money laundering at a Swiss bank is a hero or a fabulist, spends time in Vietnam with Anthony Bourdain, chronicles the quest to bring down a cheerful international black market arms merchant, and profiles a passionate death penalty attorney who represents the “worst of the worst,” among other bravura works of literary journalism.
The appearance of his byline in The New Yorker is always an event, and collected here for the first time readers can see his work forms an always enthralling but deeply human portrait of criminals and rascals, as well as those who stand up against them.
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As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
We also may use affiliate links in our posts, as well. Thanks!Rogues by Patrick Radden Keefe
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Small Things Like These
Now this wasn’t a recommendation I gave out, but I watched a friend at the bookstore (who used to work there) talk to someone about how tender and wonderful this was. It’s also longlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
It is 1985 in a small Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man faces into his busiest season. Early one morning, while delivering an order to the local convent, Bill makes a discovery which forces him to confront both his past and the complicit silences of a town controlled by the church.
Already an international bestseller, Small Things Like These is a deeply affecting story of hope, quiet heroism, and empathy from one of our most critically lauded and iconic writers.
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This book is available from:
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.
We also may use affiliate links in our posts, as well. Thanks!Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
Amanda, I just want to say that I always enjoy the Get Rec’d posts—I found a number of non-romance books I’ve enjoyed and it’s given me a lot of ideas for books to give other people (e.g., THE BANGALORE DETECTIVES CLUB looks right over the plate for my mom.)
From John Scalzi’s blog, Tune in Tomorrow: The Curious, Calamitous, Cockamamie Story Of Starr Weatherby And The Greatest Mythic Reality Show Ever by Randee Dawn. I know reality show settings are catnip for many members of the Bitchery, and this one stars humans but is produced by and for an audience of the Fae, which may extend the appeal to people (me) who think reality shows are high-key horrifying.
@FashionablyEvil: Thank you so much! I’m happy they help!
Small Things Like These is a great book. It’s short but packs a punch. I don’t want to say too much but it’s a morality play. And it covers a dark part of recent Irish history. After you have consumed a lot of Christmas romances this one will break things up. And then you’re going to need to read more Christmas romances afterward.