An international best seller: a vivid, masterly novel about a Flemish man who reconstructs his grandfather's story—his hopes, loves, and art, all disrupted by the First World War—from the unflinching notebooks he filled with pieces of his life. The life of Urbain Martien—artist, soldier, survivor of World War I—lies contained in two notebooks he left behind when he died in 1981. His grandson, a writer, retells his story, the notebooks giving him the impetus to imagine his way into the locked chambers of Urbain's memory. He vividly recounts a whole life: Urbain as the child of a lowly church painter, retouching his father's work; dodging death in a foundry; fighting in the war that altered the course of history; marrying the sister of the woman he truly loved; haunted by an ever-present reminder of the artist he had hoped to be and the soldier he was forced to become. Wrestling with this story, Urbain's grandson straddles past and present,... Views: 25
Sparks fly when a rigid FBI agent and a patrol sergeant collide on the path to catch a killer. Special Agent Taylor Carrigan takes 'control freak' to the extreme. Her need for structured rigidity rules her life—and her job at the FBI. She doesn't do emotion, so when her fiancé is murdered, she doesn't know how to deal with the internal fallout. Antioch Police Sergeant Shannon Crowley has been intrigued with the uptight FBI agent for months. When he looks at Taylor, he sees more than the mask she hides behind. She doesn't have time for the cop who won't quit chasing her—she's got chasing of her own to do. Taylor admits he calms her, but he's a distraction she can't afford. She's playing a dangerous game, riding the line between revenge and justice. Keeping Shannon close could give Taylor the balance she desperately needs, but it would put something more than her case in jeopardy—her heart. With so much on the line, is she... Views: 25
While teaching writing at an artists colony in Woodstock, mystery editor Claire Rawlings gets some bad vibes from the writers there. And things only get worse when she finds the colony's resident beauty dead in the bathtub. Views: 25
