The Crazy School by Cornelia Read

We were blessed with a couple of lazy snow days this week, so I spent one of them curled up with The Crazy School. This one attracted me by title alone. I did not realize that it was a sequel to the first Madeline Dare novel, A Field of Darkness, but I just may get that one from the library and read it too. Dare is a teacher at a school for psychologically disturbed teens. The plot turns in to a crime story and the psychological twists keep the pages turning pretty quickly. Not my usual genre, this book entertained me, right up to the chilling twist of events in the last chapters. Read Read.

The Senator's Wife by Sue Miller

I decided to give Sue Miller another try in this year of Senators and Presidential hopefuls. The story centers around Delia, whose unfaithful husband, is Senator Tom Naughton. The fact that he cheats on his wife with his daughter's friend who is their holiday houseguest is just one of the reasons he is an unlikeable character. But Delia seems genuine and so does her friendship with Meri, the young woman who, with her husband, moves into the other side of the Naughton's duplex. The last chapter of the novel made me simultaneously disgusted with all of the characters. Miller's ending is cheaper than a cheater.

Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name by Vendela Vida

I probably would not have read this book had it not been for the line in Vida's bio blurb stating that she is the coeditor of The Believer magazine. The last book I read took my to Norway, and this one to Lapland. Clarissa, the protagonist of this novel, goes in search of her real father's identity, which leads her to the Sami people, the indigenous Laplanders. This quick read reminded me there are colder places than Cleveland, Ohio in February.

Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson

This novel was a Norwegian best seller. The story is told from the perspective of the main character, Trond, who has moved to a backwoods cabin in Eastern Norway to spend the last years of his life. There he reflects on the turbulent events of his youth and begins to understand his past. Petterson's prose is sparse and his landscape is alive.