Sep 4, 2026 | book review, Book Reviews, City Under One Roof, Iris Yamashita, mystery
The first book in Iris Yamashita’s Cara Kennedy Series, City Under One Roof introduces readers to a cast of intriguing characters caught up in a murder mystery that unfolds in an Alaskan town contained within one building and wholly cut off from outside help…or escape.
No one really visits Point Mettier, Alaska in the off-season when the winter snows thicken and traveling becomes hazardous.
But all that changes when a couple of body parts wash ashore in a hidden cove and are found by Amy Lin, a local high school student.
She seems trustworthy, despite lying about exactly how she found a dead man’s foot.
Amy is one of the main characters, and as a curious, intelligent, and bored seventeen-year-old, she is the perfect entryway into the myriad quirks of the lonely town and its reclusive residents.
Like Lonnie, the local with a pet moose who is terrified of being sent back to a mental institution.
Such is the adeptness of Yamashita’s extremely realistic characters that Lonnie can provide an unreliable perspective that readers will sympathize with while they try to make sense of her highly-guarded thoughts and secrets.
Anchorage detective Cara Kennedy is the one who disturbs the status quo when she arrives via the one-way, one-lane car tunnel in a terribly anxious, yet determined state to follow-up on the severed body parts.
Otherwise, she would not dare to brave such a claustrophobic setting and risk a complete nervous breakdown.
As a protagonist, the brave, witty, and staunch detective is on a mission to uncover the truth, no matter the cost to herself.
She is such a fun, complex, and endearing character that has undergone tragic circumstances leading her on a nightmarish pursuit.
And Cara’s nightmare extends itself.
For aside from when it is safe to boat into and out of Point Mettier, which is usually not during the eight-months-long winter period, the tunnel is the lone escape route for motor vehicles…and it collapses during a storm-caused avalanche shortly after Cara arrives.
Cara finds herself stuck in the Dave-Co, a single condominium high-rise that acts as a motel, permanent residence, school, hospital, restaurant, and police station for the 205 town residents.
Besieged by the aftermath of the blizzard, in the epitome of isolation, the extraordinary circumstances surrounding the murder investigation in Point Mettier build the tension and magnify its effects on all of the people involved.
A potential love interest for Cara is the new Point Mettier cop on the scene, J.B., who is a good guy, though flawed and may be more honest than his boss, Chief Sipley, would like.
The magnitude of a City Under One Roof’s bio-dome-like circumstances, if that bio-dome was subject to vicious and deadly temperature drops amidst blizzard conditions, is immense and impactful, taking the reader on a thrill-ride, with laughs and fist-clenching suspense in good measure.
Readers will feel besieged themselves by the remoteness and the heavy snowfall presented.
I love a good story where the setting is so well crafted that it becomes another character of significance in the book and such is the case with City Under One Roof.
I recommend reading this one by the fire wrapped in a blanket…and after…start book two in Iris Yamashita’s Cara Kennedy Series, Village in the Dark.
“Iris Yamashita’s City Under One Roof: Tense, Riveting & Real” Was Written By R.J. Huneke.
Iris is the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter for the script “Letters From Iwo Jima” directed by Clint Eastwood. The film was nominated for 4 Oscars including “Best Picture” and “Best Original Screenplay.”
City Under One Roof is her debut mystery novel and the first in the Cara Kennedy series, set in a tiny Alaskan town where all the residents lives in a single high-rise building. The book was Crime Fiction Lover’s Editor’s Choice for Best Debut Crime Novel of the year and was named one of the Best Thrillers of the year by Washington Post as well as one of the Best Crime Fiction of the year by Library Journal and one of the Best Fiction Books of the year by Reader’s Digest.
Village in the Dark is her follow up novel to City Under One Roof. ~Goodreads.com
May 7, 2026 | Agatha Christie, book review, Book Reviews, Hercule Poirot, Spoiler-Free
Agatha Christie’s magnum opus is the fourth installment in the Hercule Poirot Series, and as this grisly murder investigation unfolds, the reader is given more insight into the now ‘retired’ eccentric Belgian sleuth than we have had to date.
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is one of the all time great crime-mystery novels and it forever deeply changed fiction.
Treasure a book that achieves brilliance while delving into wholly new territory.
For Agatha Christie’s innovation here radically added to what is possible for an author to do in a novel.
I cannot be more specific because I will not ruin it for you.
The following book review of Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is Spoiler-Free**
Usually, I read the books of a series in numerical order – or at least the numerical order the author states they should be read in – but if you have not read much of Christie’s Poirot series, this rare gem is a great starting point.
The unique, comical, and ruthless genius of Hercule Poirot brought out of retirement in a quiet English neighborhood is fleshed out brilliantly as an unruly case unwinds.
In some of the Poirot books there could be so much more of the private detective.
This is not a bad thing as the reader yearns to know more about the short quizzical man with his glorious mustaches.
But with a locked room mystery centered around the murder of one Roger Ackroyd, Christie brings in so much humanity and personality in the entire cast of intriguing characters that I feel she had to bring Poirot around more often, and with more talk of his past, and with some of the most outstanding lines in literature (see below) to compete for the reader’s attention.
The sweaty tension, the gripping pacing, and the balancing act of a trove of interesting characters saying and doing things arbitrary or pivotal make for an intense and entertaining mystery.
Like the dagger, this story is a jewel, an all time classic and one of the greatest works of fiction.
Quotes from Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd:
- “Fortunately words, ingeniously used, will serve to mask the ugliness of naked facts.” -Poirot
- “It is completely unimportant,” said Poirot. “That is why it is so interesting,” he added softly.” -Poirot
- “Understand this, I mean to arrive at the truth. The truth, however ugly in itself, is always curious and beautiful to the seeker after it…Messieurs et mesdames, I tell you, I mean to know. And I shall know – in spite of you all.” – Poirot
- “Everyone had a hand in the elucidation of the mystery. It was rather like a jig-saw puzzle to which everyone contributed their own little piece of knowledge or discovery. But their task ended there. To Poirot alone belongs the renown of fitting those pieces into their correct place.” – Dr. Sheppard
- “My friend Hastings, he of whom I told you, used to say of me that I was a human oyster. But he was unjust. Of facts, I keep nothing to myself. But to everyone his own interpretations of them.” – Poirot
- “Oh! money! All the troubles in the world can be put down to money—or the lack of it.” – Poirot
- “Fortunately words, ingeniously used, will serve to mask the ugliness of naked facts.” – Poirot
“The Murder of Roger Ackroyd Mystery Confounds Hercule Poirot” Was Written By R.J. Huneke.
Feb 12, 2024 | book review, Book Reviews, Brandy Schillace, mystery, Spoiler-Free, THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE
THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE by Brandy Schillace is all aces in TFF’s book, and this preview review aims to uncover some of what makes this engaging mystery so damn good, without lifting the veil too much.
This story is one of the more perplexing murder mysteries you may come across, combining new, thrilling elements with style!
Not only are the brilliant and extremely engaging facets to this case enveloping, but solving a murder by antique pistol, as well as the mysterious disappearance of a rare Ardemore family portrait that may be connected, prove to be difficult entanglements that unwind in wholly unexpected ways and leaves the reader feverishly turning pages to follow the threads.
The following Preview Book Review of THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE by Brandy Schillace is SPOILER-FREE.
Schillace’s characters, from the outsider-protagonist Jo Jones, to the Detective Inspector MacAdams with his inferiority complex due to his divorce, to Gwilym the young antique and hobby collector, and to the brazen Irish innkeeper and fellow outsider, Tula, they all stand up with great intrigue and pack a punch.
To ramble a little, characters are the lifeblood of fiction, with few memorable exceptions.
The one I come back to frequently is the Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov, because it simultaneously thwarts the rules by creating a compelling and innovative pillar of science-fiction without (I argue, though some disagree) characters being central to the story told over the course of centuries.
I appreciate Foundation for that, but my favorite work of Asimov is and will always be THE END OF ETERNITY.
Aside from being used for near every time travel tale post-H.G. Wells, THE END OF ETERNITY has memorable and incredibly realistic characters that you root for.
They make you love the story.
Just as each character in THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE stands out in their own ways and brings you on a wholly uncharted journey to a murder / painting mystery, this too is a story to love.
The young American woman, Jo, inherits an old estate with a decrepit English manor house that holds her in uncomfortable territory.
She finds hidden in a locked room what appears to be an Ardemore family portrait of an unknown relative that was taken from the library for some reason.
Shortly thereafter, it is stolen.
And then a body turns up.
The neurodivergent Jo felt like an outsider before she becomes a suspect in the murder, and that feeling only grows as she attempts to solve the crimes and find out who was the Ardemore mystery woman.
The witty, charming, and intelligent character of Jo is thirsty for answers.
And despite her difficulty overcoming a not-too-distant divorce with a husband that continually reminded her of her autism and her behavioral faux pas – some of which she deems may be fair and some of which are certainly not – she collects herself time and again and proves to be insightful, well-read, and courageous as she presses on.
The insight into the way this character thinks is exciting, and makes me feel like I am privy to a behind the scenes look into the methods of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes that is essential to their effectiveness in solving a crime.
Schillace’s Jo Jones is flawed and extremely realistic.
The ways in which Jo reflects on how she thinks – especially using memories of her experiences to guide her – makes for a refreshing new perspective into someone who is on the spectrum and not just surviving society, but thriving despite it.
In a touching moment, the Irish innkeeper speaks of leaving her home and landing in England as an outsider, like Jo, and then the younger woman reveals a fun and difficult attribute:
“Words have just always been my people…and I don’t forget them after I read them.
“Ever? Like a photographic memory?” Tula asked. Jo scrunched up her nose. She’d never liked the term.
“It doesn’t work like that. I can recite from most of the books I’ve read–but it has to be triggered…sometimes the connections I see aren’t really there…but sometimes it means I see connections other people can’t see.”
The marked self-reflection makes the reader empathize with Jo in a deeply impactful way.
Despite the social difficulties of inter-personal relationships and reactions to situations, social norms, and speech that are often a struggle for Jo Jones, she proves to be an exceptional force in the book and a very relatable person of interest.
THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE by Brandy Schillace is out tomorrow – February 13, 2024 – so get your copy post-haste!
“THE FRAMED WOMEN OF ARDEMORE HOUSE by Brandy Schillace” Book Review Was Written By R.J. Huneke.
Mar 30, 2022 | 361, book review, Book Reviews, Donald E. Westlake, Hard Case Crime
361 By Donald E. Westlake: unique, hard-hitting brilliance brings hard-boiled gritty noir down an alley that you cannot leave until the book is done.
Hard Case Crime thankfully brings many treasures like 361 back to the forefront of fiction on today’s market.
Personally, despite loving crime, mystery, and hard-boiled fiction, I had yet to read a novel of Donald Westlake’s.
And here is the beauty of HCC’s paperback series: it is very easy for a good friend in the know to mail me a book that will kick my ass, and get me into gear, just like 361 did.
If you love Raymond Chandler, Mickey Spillane, Max Allan Collin’s Quarry series (to name one), then this 1962 publication will be very appealing and not the least because it is a style all Westlake’s own.
Warning, Will Robinson! This book review of 361 by Donald E. Westlake has Spoilers* for the opening pages.
Ray Kelly has landed in New York retired from his time abroad as a US military man. He feels bad at talking to his brother’s wife, who he has not met, on the phone to get directions. He cares about family.
When Ray’s father, Willard, picks him up and talks about how his brother settled down happily and then remarks how good his Ray looks after all those years, father and son break down crying.
Dad brags about the air conditioning in the car and remarks, “chased a lot of ambulances lately,” as he was an attorney with a good sense of humor.
Westlake has brought a happy family together and the pair drive over New York City’s George Washington Bridge in what has been an uplifting tale so far.
In 361, Westlake pulls one of the fastest literally punches to ever gut the main character and the reader.
And then a Chrysler pulls up beside them and fires a gun, so that Willard appears to vomit blood and falls over into Ray’s lap as the car hits the bridge barrier.
A month later, Ray wakes in a hospital minus an eye and his one leg shattered and put back together in a way that would leave him with a debilitating limp.
End of Spoiler Warning*
Westlake pulled the rug out from under me so quickly I nearly dropped the book.
Readers beware of Donald E. Westlake, whose use of realistic dialogue, rich character feeling, and sharp descriptions make up boisterously boiled worlds that are increasingly intriguing as the tale winds on.
The plot gets harrier and harrier as it goes on too.
There are some mysteries and some surprises.
And 361’s ending is wholly original, utterly pragmatic, and very satisfying.
“361 By Donald E. Westlake: Unique, Hard-Hitting Brilliance” was written by R.J. Huneke.
