Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry

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Journalist Alice Scott longs to move from writing features and profiles on minor celebrities to writing a complete biography on someone uber famous. Someone like Margaret Ives, a former media darling who comes from one of the most famous families of the twentieth century. Despite Margaret being in hiding for at least three decades, without any known sightings, Alice thinks she has finally found her. Yes, it will be fun to try something new and grow her skills, but it will have the added bonus of making her mom finally take notice of her work. 

Alice is one of the most positive people you will ever meet and she can hardly believe her luck that she has finally managed to track down Margaret.  She arrives on Little Crescent Island, Georgia and can hardly wait to convince Margaret to start working with her.  That is until she bumps into Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Hayden Anderson as she is leaving Margaret’s house. Now Margaret’s comment about having “a couple of other branches to shake” makes more sense.  

Hayden Anderson is a music journalist, but is best known for writing a Pulitzer prize-winning celebrity biography on a famous Americana singer with dementia. Alice cannot believe that she might miss out on this opportunity after spending so much time tracking down Margaret.  

Margaret invites both of them to work with her for one month. They will take turns meeting with her, and at the end of the month, they will each have a chance to pitch their idea for the book, then she will choose who she wants to work with.   

Neither are happy about having to audition for this opportunity with Margaret, but it’s the chance of a lifetime, so they both agree to move forward. What follows is a month of meetings and competition for the coveted contract. Also during this time, the pair of writers get to know each other better thanks to run-ins at the small town’s local coffee shop and restaurants. Though talking about the book is off limits because they have both signed a NDA.  

My favorite part of this novel was Alice’s perpetually upbeat attitude and the story of Margaret’s life. I adore Emily Henry and her books. What a treat to have another one this year! 

Review written by: Jeana Gockley, Joplin Public Library Director

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New Database: LOTE4 Kids

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2024 Alex Award Winners

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Read It | Watch It

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Remembering JPL Teen Librarian, Beth Snow

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It is with deep sadness and heavy hearts that we announce Beth Snow, beloved Teen Services Librarian of Joplin Public Library, passed away peacefully on June 12, 2024 after a long battle with cancer.  

Known for her encouraging words, her joyful spirit, and her commitment to the Library and its patrons, Beth devoted her career to ensuring that every teen felt welcomed and supported by libraries. Beth spent over 20 years of her life working in libraries, eight of those at Joplin Public Library.  Her memory will live on in those that knew and loved her.

During an interview in 2022, she explained her passion for Teen Services, “The Teen Department offers a safe space, free of judgment for teens to grow, to explore, to deal, to connect, or to just “be”.  Building relationships is the foundation, the bulk of what happens here.  Teen Services can be as incredible, beautiful, heart-breaking, messy, and glorious as adolescence itself!”

Beth’s visitation will be Thursday, June 20, from 6:00-7:00 pm at Mason-Woodard Mortuary and Crematory.  Her funeral will be held Friday, June 21, at 2:00 pm at First Presbyterian Church in Joplin.  Her full obituary may be viewed here.  

The library will be closed Friday, June 21, from 1:00-6:00 pm to allow staff to attend the funeral.  Webb City Public Library has graciously agreed to host the Children’s program, Bobby Norfolk Storyteller, scheduled for 2:00 pm on Friday.

Patrons are encouraged to visit the Library to sign a memorial card that will be shared with Beth’s family. Also, individuals may participate in a memory-sharing activity in the teen department as a tribute to Beth.

The Fields by Erin Young

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Robyn Young writes historical fiction in her home country of England. Under the pseudonym Erin Young, she has crossed the pond, at least in print, and penned her first thriller. Set in Waterloo, Iowa and the surrounding farm country, The Fields is a thriller that makes a statement on big agriculture and family farms.

It opens with Chloe Miller running for her life in a cornfield. When a drone approaches she curls as close to the corn stalks as possible hoping to hide from her pursuer. Days later her body is discovered by a co-op farmer surveying the crop.

From the wounds on the body it is obvious that this is a murder, making it Sergeant Riley Fisher’s first big case as head of the Investigations Division of the Black Hawk County Sheriff’s Department. The pressure is intense as the sheriff wants a quick resolution, the men who wanted the promotion she got are waiting for her to fail, and the victim was a childhood friend. A friend from a time that Riley desperately wishes she could forget.

Chloe was married to James who is a researcher for GFT, a corn breeding company. They live in an affluent part of town so how did Chloe end up in the field and where is her car? James immediately becomes a suspect as he never reported his wife as missing.

Her team starts building a case, collecting evidence and conducting interviews. Then another body is found. This victim was strangled but had some of the same wounds found on Chloe. Nicole King was killed in an old meat-packing plant and evidence points to someone camping in the plant. Besides Nicole’s purse and a backpack there are lots of pill bottles from a local pharmacy. The evidence leads to a displaced veteran, George Anderson. But Anderson seems to have disappeared along with others who have been living on the streets.

The pharmacist identifies the drug as Fenozen which at least one of his former employees had been stealing. One of the suspected thieves is Sarah Foster. Sarah is known to the department because her daughter, Gracie, has been missing for weeks and believed to be a runaway.

Despite the wounds the two victims don’t have anything in common so James Miller is still Riley’s number one suspect in Chloe’s death. First the sheriff and then the governor warns her to leave James alone. Riley’s father worked for the governor in the past so he knows her but why is he steering her away from Miller?

Then Gracie is found in the river with similar wounds to the other two victims. Black Hawk County now has the requisite three bodies to think they have a serial killer. But the only thing tying the victims together is the strange wounds. The cause of death is different for each victim and they have nothing in common except their gender.

Is there one murderer, two or even three? When the FBI comes in to assist, Riley knows she has to solve the case quickly or lose it. But how do you find such an unpredictable killer or killers?

There is a lot going on in this novel. Riley has the pressures of her job and uneasy relationships with some of her colleagues plus the past trauma this case stirs up. Then there is her substance abusing brother, his fourteen year old daughter and her grandfather dying from dementia. Add in the complexities of the case along with some political intrigue and eco-terrorists and it‘s hard to keep everyone straight. I found myself stopping a time or two so I could remember where the character fit in.

Most of the story is in the third person but Riley speaks in her own voice occasionally and there are a couple of chapters from an unnamed character giving you a glimpse of someone spiraling out of control. Is this the killer or a potential victim?

I like well-developed characters and Riley fits the bill. Once all the different plot lines were in place the novel rushed to an action-packed ending. I will give you fair warning, the author doesn’t shy away from gory descriptions and there is a horror element I didn’t expect.

This is the first book featuring Riley Fisher. A second book, Original Sins, was released in March. If you like Karin Slaughter’s novels or enjoyed The Killing Hills by Offutt or Highway by C.J. Box, I recommend you give this title a try.

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Review written by Patty Crane, Reference Librarian

Women’s History Month

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Blind Date with a Book

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North of Nowhere by Allison Brennan

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Kristen McIntyre Reed plays soccer for her high school team, loves to help out at the ranch where her dad works, and Jason, whom she secretly likes, just kissed her for the first time. She appears to be a typical sixteen year old. But in Allison Brennan’s North of Nowhere appearances can be deceptive.

When her dad, Tony, wakes her at 5:30am her first response is to reach for her weapon. When Tony tells her simply “Plan B, baby” she immediately reaches for her sturdiest boots, dresses warmly and grabs her go bag. No questions. They trained for this; grab your bag and get your brother, Ryan. Ryan is ten years old, smart, adept, and deaf.

Plan B means Boyd has found them and they have to run. A blizzard is forecast but they have to go now, even the wait for dawn to arrive could be costly. But they need light to ‘borrow’ his boss’ plane and fly to Ennis where they will get a car and head 300 miles north to a well-stocked cabin near the Canadian border.

Boyd McIntyre runs one of the largest crime syndicates in Los Angeles and he is Kristen and Ryan’s father. Tony was part of the syndicate until five years ago when he and Maggie, Boyd’s wife and the kid’s mother, devised a plan to get out. As Maggie and Kristen are leaving to meet Tony and Ryan, Maggie is shot and killed but Kristen escapes. Since then, Tony has been hiding and protecting them in Montana.

When his search lead Boyd to Montana he hired local help to locate Tony. They soon figure out what Tony may be planning and arrive at the airfield before Tony is ready. As the plane gains speed Boyd is chasing them and fires a warning shot at the plane. It doesn’t deter Tony but soon more bullets are hitting the plane. They manage to take off but the plane is damaged and Tony was hit twice, in the arm and chest.
Only halfway to Ennis, they are forced to crash land in a lake. Kristen manages to get them off the plane and to the shore but Tony is too badly injured to go further. When they hear a helicopter overhead they know Boyd has found them. Kristen will do anything to protect Ryan, even follow Tony’s order to leave him and hike through the mountains in a desperate attempt to reach Ennis before Boyd can catch them.

Tony’s boss, Nick Lorenzo, knows something must have gone wrong for Tony to take the plane. A neighbor tells him that there was gunfire at the airfield and then the plane’s transponder notifies Nick that the plane has gone down. Nick knows the storm is coming but he needs to help Kristen and Ryan if they survived the crash. First he calls Tony’s emergency contact to notify her of the situation, Ruby McIntyre, Boyd’s sister.

Local search and rescue is tied up looking for a family that didn’t make it home so Nick and his son, Jason, set out alone. When they find the crash site, Tony is dead. They search the area for Kristen and Ryan but only find footprints. The smaller prints of the kids and three sets of adult footprints. Nick sends Jason back to get help and he follows the prints.

Ruby meanwhile is making her own arrangements to help Kristen and Ryan. At 18 she enlisted in the military to free herself from the family. She tried to help Tony and the kids five years ago but Tony cut her off. Now she’ll do whatever it takes, even parachuting onto the mountain, to find her niece and nephew.

Kristen is strong and resourceful but can she keep safe a young boy who can’t hear danger approach or a warning shout? The weather is deteriorating, the terrain is treacherous, Boyd and his men can’t be far behind and they are a long way from the first stop in Plan B.

Boyd isn’t dressed or prepared for the mountain and the weather but nothing is going to stop him from finding his kids and taking them back. Ruby is prepared and equally determined to keep the kids from Boyd. Nick’s concern is for the kids but he doesn’t know what will happen if someone gets in Boyd’s way.

This thriller has a lot of moving parts, and the characters all have backstories that are relayed over the course of the chase through the mountains. Once it gets going it is almost non-stop action and just when you think you can take a breath something more deadly than the mountains and the storm waits.

Review by Patty Crane, Reference Librarian

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Before She Finds Me by Heather Chavez

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The day has finally arrived that Julia Bennet has been both dreading and anticipating. It’s move in day at Anderson Hughes. Her only child, Cora, is starting college. Their light-hearted banner over the things in Cora’s cartful of possessions is interrupted by the arrival of her ex and Cora’s dad, Eric, along with his new wife Brie.

Things become a little tense as Brie is not Julia’s biggest fan. About to go in search of Cora’s lost phone, Julia is halted by an uneasy feeling. Is it Brie’s presence or has she sensed something else? When she hears the first pop, she listens. At the second pop she reacts and pulls Cora to the ground. The rest of the crowd is slower to respond. There are three more pops. The man that had been next to them falls and Brie collapses on top of him. Then the screaming begins.

Julia’s story begins Heather Chavez’s newest novel, Before She Finds Me, then we meet Ren. Ren Petrovic is debating with her unborn child the merits of a belly band or a shoulder holster for her gun. Of course she’d much rather be home shopping for poisons. You see Ren has an unusual profession, she is a contract killer. Nolan, her husband, deals with the clients and Ren does the research. The circumstances decide which one of them carries out the contact.

A call from Nolan interrupts her shopping. It’s a call she’s received before – a check-in call after a job to say things went ok and I’ll be home soon. The only problem, they didn’t have a job scheduled.

Back at Anderson Hughes, the shooting has stopped. Cora has a bullet wound in her arm, Brie is dead and the man that fell next to them is unconscious. As the first responders try to restore some order to the chaos and find answers, the assumption is it is another senseless mass shooting. But Julia has studied guns and violence, her own mother was murdered, and this scene doesn’t feel random.

Ren knows it’s not. Why would Nolan do a job without planning? His explanation doesn’t quite satisfy Ren. She’s a killer but one with her own code of ethics. She only kills those who deserve to die. Her research is not only to find the best way to do the job but also into the target. What did they do to warrant being killed? Nolan had two targets, one who supposedly killed someone and a person related to the first target. What was the related person’s crime?

In the days following the shooting, Julia tries to keep Cora close and help Eric. At least two are dead, Brie and the man who fell next to them. The rumor is a student is also dead. Then Julia sees footage of the shooting on the news and comes to the realization that the bullet that struck the man was intended for Cora. Without his stumble and Julia’s quick reaction, Cora might be dead. Cora was one of the targets. Then a news report reveals that a student didn’t die as rumored, she was just shot in the arm.

Ren has reservations about Nolan’s explanations but he, their unborn child, and her father are her family. Besides her code of ethics, family is all she cares about. Ren starts the research that should have been done before the shooting and discovers Julia. She is drawn to her. Her obvious love for her daughter and her love of plants are things Ren admires. If Ren could have friends, Julia could be one.

But Ren’s world is starting to unravel. Oliver Baird is rich, powerful and a client. The client Nolan thought hired them. But he is Brie’s father. He has Ren brought to him and gives her an assignment – find Brie’s killer.

Ren will do whatever it takes to protect her family including finishing the contract. Julia is equally determined to keep Cora safe and find the killer. Because the police have realized this was not random violence and Eric is a prime suspect.

Julia and Ren tell their story in alternating chapters that reveal each woman’s life while also building suspense. For me, Ren was the more interesting character even though she lacks empathy and compassion. Julia is easily likeable, Ren is not. Even though I couldn’t admire her, I found myself pulling for her and hoping she could redeem herself.

This is a suspenseful story that builds steadily then races toward the end. If you like Ruth Ware or Gillian Flynn, you might enjoy this one.

Review by Patty Crane, Reference Librarian

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