The Library Book and Expats

 October is here but it still feels like summer here. Looking forward to cooler weather.

After the Mystery Book Club read Two Nights in Lisbon by Chris Pavone, I read: 

The Expats by the same author. It is the first book in the Kate Moore series.

About: "Kate Moore is a working mother, struggling to make ends meet, to raise children, to keep a spark in her marriage . . . and to maintain an increasingly unbearable life-defining secret. So when her husband is offered a lucrative job in Luxembourg, she jumps at the chance to leave behind her double-life, to start anew.

She begins to reinvent herself as an expat, finding her way in a language she doesn’t speak, doing the housewifely things she’s never before done—play-dates and coffee mornings, daily cooking and unending laundry. Meanwhile, her husband works incessantly, doing a job Kate has never understood, for a banking client she’s not allowed to know. He’s becoming distant and evasive; she’s getting lonely and bored.

Then another American couple arrives. Kate soon becomes suspicious that these people are not who they claim to be, and terrified that her own past is catching up to her. So Kate begins to dig, to peel back the layers of deception that surround her. She discovers fake offices and shell corporations and a hidden gun; a mysterious farmhouse and numbered accounts with bewildering sums of money; a complex web of intrigue where no one is who they claim to be, and the most profound deceptions lurk beneath the most normal-looking of relationships; and a mind-boggling long-play con threatens her family, her marriage, and her life."

I liked it pretty well. It is a good spy/espionage book. You aren't sure who are the good guys. Plenty of twists. Similar to Two Nights in Lisbon with the hidden identities and sneaking around. If you like Two Nights in Lisbon or other books by Chris Pavone, I think you would like this book. 

There is a second book in the series: The Paris Diversion. Kate Moore book #2. 

I also started The Library Book by Susan Orlean on audio. 

About: "On the morning of April 29, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. As the moments passed, the patrons and staff who had been cleared out of the building realized this was not the usual fire alarm. As one fireman recounted, “Once that first stack got going, it was ‘Goodbye, Charlie.’” The fire was disastrous: it reached 2000 degrees and burned for more than seven hours. By the time it was extinguished, it had consumed four hundred thousand books and damaged seven hundred thousand more. Investigators descended on the scene, but more than thirty years later, the mystery remains: Did someone purposefully set fire to the library—and if so, who?

Weaving her lifelong love of books and reading into an investigation of the fire, award-winning New Yorker reporter and New York Times bestselling author Susan Orlean delivers a mesmerizing and uniquely compelling book that manages to tell the broader story of libraries and librarians in a way that has never been done before.

In The Library Book, Orlean chronicles the LAPL fire and its aftermath to showcase the larger, crucial role that libraries play in our lives; delves into the evolution of libraries across the country and around the world, from their humble beginnings as a metropolitan charitable initiative to their current status as a cornerstone of national identity; brings each department of the library to vivid life through on-the-ground reporting; studies arson and attempts to burn a copy of a book herself; reflects on her own experiences in libraries; and reexamines the case of Harry Peak, the blond-haired actor long suspected of setting fire to the LAPL more than thirty years ago.

Along the way, Orlean introduces us to an unforgettable cast of characters from libraries past and present—from Mary Foy, who in 1880 at eighteen years old was named the head of the Los Angeles Public Library at a time when men still dominated the role, to Dr. C.J.K. Jones, a pastor, citrus farmer, and polymath known as “The Human Encyclopedia” who roamed the library dispensing information; from Charles Lummis, a wildly eccentric journalist and adventurer who was determined to make the L.A. library one of the best in the world, to the current staff, who do heroic work every day to ensure that their institution remains a vital part of the city it serves."

This is a nonfiction/true crime book. I like some true crime and since this is about books and libraries I wanted to give it a try.

I did find the information the author discusses about how libraries work - how books are acquired and processed for libraries, interesting. How many staff it takes to manage a library, especially one the size of the Los Angeles Public library. All the roles a public library plays in a community - besides checking out mystery books for me. :) I found it interesting that the LAPL played/plays an important role in serving the homeless community, helping them use the resources to hopefully better their lives. I also found the history of libraries interesting.

The book also tells the story of the main suspect and his life.

I did not finish it but I thought I would talk about it anyway for people that may be interested in this topic. I think it is a good nonfiction book. I wanted to get to the crime sooner though and ended up not finishing it.  But if this interests you, give it a go. It did win a  Goodreads Choice Award and was nominated for a Best Nonfiction award in 2018. 

Just finished Beware the Woman by Megan Abbott. I will be telling you what the Mystery Book Club and I thought about it.