Wyoming Wild (Savage Wells #3) by Sarah M. Eden (2023)

 

When reading Wyoming Wild, I experienced the same warm feelings I did when watching TV westerns back in the day.  Good triumphing over evil; the white hat always wins. In Wyoming Wild, the U.S. Marshall is a young John Hawkings (“Hawk”) but I pictured him as James Arness appeared in Gunsmoke.

When Marshall Hawkings receives an anonymous telegraph warning him of a plot against his life, he immediately begins to investigate. After Hawk traces the telegraph to Sand Creek, Wyoming he and female deputy Paisley take up residence on an area farm posing as brother (John) and sister (Mary). It isn’t long before the two meet the sheriff’s daughter, Liesl Hodges, who they discover is doing everything she can to protect the townspeople from its violent and corrupt sheriff. Everyone in the town is afraid of Sheriff Hodges and his cronies. But when Liesl discovers John is completely unfazed by the sheriff’s attempts at intimidation, she thinks she finally has found an ally in her struggle.

All is good until Liesl learns that John has been lying to her about who he is; another in a long list of men who have betrayed her. Although Liesl continues to distrust Hawk, she goes along with his plan to end the sheriff’s reign of terror. Of course, planning is one thing and execution is something else entirely.

There are other mysteries along the way; identifying the person stealing land deeds from under the town’s landowners who must now pay an exorbitant tax for the right to stay on their own land and a corrupt deputy on Hawk’s payroll. Wyoming Wild reads like the westerns of yore; is well written, wholesome, and a quick read. I enjoyed every minute of the adventure.

4.17 stars on Goodreads, 4.6 on Amazon

Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese (2022)

Hester will be of particular interest to fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter as it is the author’s imagining of the woman who inspired the main character, Hester Prynne. For those forced to read The Scarlet Letter and hated the novel, Hester will have you reconsidering your opinion.

The heroine, Isobel Gamble is a gifted needleworker, with a very special talent she keeps hidden from the world. She and her husband Edward, an apothecary with a fondness for opium, leave Scotland for Salem, Massachusetts in the early 1800s to escape Edward’s growing debts. But only days after their arrival, Isobel learns Edward has signed up to be a medic on a departing trade ship. Isobel finds herself penniless and alone in a strange country where she must rely on her needle and her inner strength to make a life for herself.

When Isobel meets a young Nathaniel Hathorne, the two are instantly drawn to one other. They have much in common, Hathorne is haunted by his ancestor’s role in the city’s witch trials and Isobel is troubled by her own special talents. Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer as it becomes doubtful that Edward will ever return from the sea. Like Hester Prynne, Isobel finds Hathorne will not stand by her when she needs him the most.

Lico Albanese’s Hester includes vivid descriptions of the Salem witch trails in the late 1600s and the beginnings of the Underground Railroad in the early 19^th century, as well as a look into how immigrants were treated at that time. I found the book impossible to put down after Isobel arrives in America.

4.0 stars on Goodreads, 4.3 on Amazon

Blind Spots by Thomas Mullen (2023)

 

Seven years before the story begins, the entire world was hit with a fast moving virus (“The Blinding”), resulting in complete blindness for the entire population. Millions of people died that first year due to panic and the resulting drug overdoses, suicides, rioting, and fires. The following year, Eye Tech, now the most powerful corporation in the world, introduced a cranial implant called a vidder which downloads visual information directly into the brain on what the eyes should be seeing. Blind Spots is the story of what happens when someone learns to hack the technology and can change what the wearer sees.

Homicide detective Mark Owens has been on the force since before The Blinding. When a scientist is murdered and the only witness insists the killer was blacked out of her vision, Owens doesn’t believe her―until he experiences the phenomena himself. No one believes him either until they witness the same thing right before they die. Suspects range from the tech billionaire who designed the vidder to anti-modernity cultists. Owens must investigate them all knowing he can’t trust his own eyes. Parallel to the murder plotline is the internal affairs investigation into the suicide of Owens’s wife Jeanie.

The reader can’t help but draw parallels to today’s world- the COVID pandemic, those that get vaccine and those that won’t or can’t afford it, search engine type results, complete with pop-ups, fake news, and corporations that hold the real power. I found Blind Spots a fascinating read.

3.89 stars on Goodreads, 4.1 on Amazon