Wednesday Book Review: Inferno

Inferno

by Dan Brown

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Dan Brown's Inferno starts with Robert Langdon waking up in a hospital room with no clue where he is and no memory of the last forty-eight hours. An attractive doctor named Sienna Brooks tells him he is in Florence and has amnesia due to being shot in the head. Fortunately, it was only a graze, but he is still disoriented. He has vague memories of scenes seemingly out of a horror movie and a white-haired woman telling him "seek and find". Things get even more perilous when a leather-clad woman bursts into the hospital and shoots another doctor. Sienna and Robert manage to escape to her apartment. There she shows him a strange artifact that had been found in his clothes that projects an image from Dante's Inferno but the picture has been altered, leaving him with a puzzle that must be solved within 24 hours to a global catastrophe.But as we and Robert learn, nothing is exactly as it seems.

Enjoyable thriller that give the reader something to think about in between the action sequences. I could tell more, but then you'd want to kill me!

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Linda

Dear FCC: I checked this book out of the library.

Goodreads Reviews: Historical Mysteries I Loved

A Darker God by Barbara Cleverly
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In Letty's third outing set in 1928 Athens, Letty's mentor, Sir Andrew Merriman, is killed at the dress rehearsal of a Greek tragedy he is directing about the murder of King Agamemnon by his vengeful wife Clytemnestra. As more facts come to light, the parallels between ancient and modern become eerie. Personal vendettas and politics entwine in nefarious plots, and Letty's life is endangered. I found the political aspects interesting, as I'm not familiar with this period of Greek history. I love this series, and enjoyed this suspenseful episode, though I missed the archeological focus of the first two books. I am definitely hoping for a fourth book, with Letty off digging again!

Mr. Churchill's Secretary by Susan Elia MacNeal
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've long been a fan of Winston Churchill, so couldn't resist this one. It's the first of the Maggie Hope mystery series, about a young woman in London at the start of World War II. A mathematician, Maggie hopes to do more for the war effort than type, but takes a job as a secretary in the Prime Minister's office. She has no idea that she is of interest to the authorities because of her parentage, of which she knows very little, having been raised in the US by her aunt. The likable characters, exciting plot and a great sense of time and place make this a marvelous read.

What I like about both books is a strong female character trying to make her way in a man's world, and the strong sense of time and place. Do you enjoy historical mysteries?

Linda

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