Book Review: If You Can Hear This by Faith Gardner

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If You Can Hear This  by Faith Gardner is a Young Adult Mystery & Thriller novel about a high school AV Club and the search of their teacher who is missing. The expected publication date of this book is November 19, 2024. I'd like to thank NetGalley for sending me an Advanced Readers Copy (ARC) of this book for free in exchange for my honest review.   Overall, I can say that I really enjoyed the storyline. It reminded me of the Point Horror Books of the 1980's and 1990's and followed a similar formula. There were plenty of suspects and motives throughout but was a bit predictable. Additionally, I liked that the author had a diverse group of characters in the book, including two or three from the LGTBQ+ community, a couple that were people of color, and one that had a mental illness. I think it's important to include a diverse group of characters so that everyone has a book to read that depicts someone like them as well as educating others on people who are different

Book Review: The Devil's Tickets: A Vengeful Wife, a Fatal Hand, and a New American Age by Gary M. Pomerantz

1929, Kansas City:  Myrtle and Jack Bennett invite another couple over to play Bridge for the evening. During the competitive game, Myrtle grumbles that Jack is lousy player, and he slaps her and announces that he's leaving. Moments later, Myrtle shoots and kills her husband. Subsequently, Myrtle Bennett is put on trial for the murder of Jack and is represented by onetime presidential candidate, James A. Reed.

I won The Devil's Tickets: A Vengeful Wife, a Fatal Hand, and a New American Age by Gary M. Pomerantz in Goodreads.com's First Reads Giveaway. Entering the giveaway because I thought the book sounded intriguing, I was ecstatic when I found out that I actually won a copy of the book. 

However, it was a different story once I sat down to actually read the book. Although I don't read a lot of non-fiction, I do enjoy a well written account of events that happened in the past. This was not one of those books . . . it read like a text book. Painfully boring best describes The Devil's Tickets: A Vengeful Wife, a Fatal Hand, and a New American Age

Knowing that the murder took place over a bridge game going into the book, I expected that there would be a bit of background about the game. However, I didn't expect it to go into such detail about it and Ely Culbertson, a Russian who made it an "ultimate battle of wits between men and women" and not such a trivial game. It felt like there wasn't enough information about the murder and the trial to actually write a book without heavily talking about Culbertson.

What I did find interesting was that James A. Reed represented Myrtle Bennett. He was a senator, attorney, and at one time was the Democratic Presidential Candidate. He was friends with William Randolph Hearst and represented Henry Ford. It seems odd to me that someone who ran with such wealthy, well known people would get involved in this case. However, it did make me want to learn more about him, but I have yet to see if there are any biographies out there about him.

Unfortunately, I would not recommend The Devil's Tickets: A Vengeful Wife, a Fatal Hand, and a New American Age to anyone. I gave it one out of five stars on Goodreads.com.



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