Kate’s 2¢: “The Wife Upstairs” by Freida McFadden

“The Wife Upstairs” by Freida McFadden

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Angie Kane did a good job of narrating this well crafted suspenseful story.

   I enjoyed the mental challenge of this story. I’m still not sure exactly who was fooling whom.

A few take-aways:

–You never realize how much people like you until you’re leaving.

–I’d never see Mac again…I was a married woman…and that was that.

–You never know what’s lurking under the surface.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.freidamcfadden.com

Freida McFadden (born May 1, 1980) is an American thriller author and practicing physician specializing in brain injury. Freida McFadden is a pseudonym.

Biography[edit]

From New York City, McFadden attended Harvard University as an undergraduate. She practices medicine in the Boston area.[2]

McFadden self-published her first book through Amazon KDP in 2013. Her 2022 book The Housemaid was an international bestseller.[3] A film adaptation of the novel is in production for Lionsgate, with Rebecca Sonnenshine writing the screenplay, and Hidden Pictures’ Todd Lieberman and Alex Young producing.[4] It is directed by Paul Feig, and the cast includes Sydney Sweeney as Millie, Amanda Seyfried as Nina, Brandon Sklenar as Andrew, Michele Morrone as Enzo. Filming began in January 2025, and it is scheduled to be released on December 25, 2025.[5]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The wife upstairs DB130129

McFadden, Freida. Reading time: 10 hours, 5 minutes.

Read by Kane, Angie.

Suspense Fiction

“Victoria Barnett has it all: a great career as a nurse practitioner, a handsome and loving husband, a beautiful home in the suburbs, and a plan to fill it with children. Life is perfect — or so it seems. Then she’s in a terrible accident … and everything falls apart. Now Victoria is unable to walk. She can’t feed or dress herself. She can’t even speak. She is confined to the top floor of her house with twenty-four-hour care. Sylvia Robinson is hired by Victoria’s husband to help care for her. But it turns out Victoria isn’t as impaired as Sylvia was led to believe. There’s a story Victoria desperately wants to tell … if only she could get the words out. Then Sylvia discovers Victoria’s diary hidden away in a drawer. And what’s inside is shocking.” — From publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

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Kate’s 2¢: “Flashlight” by Susan Choi

“Flashlight” by Susan Choi

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Eunice Wong did an excellent job of narrating this Asian culture story.

   It never ceases to amaze me how much political hatred can harm families and the cruelty that one person can inflict on another.

A few take-aways”

–Even the people who claim to be listening, were not really listening.

–The world had not been fit for either of them

–…like an eraser that never stopped rubbing, seemed to rub them out, too.

–The same motion that drew Louisa into the foreground, pushed Anne back.

–…Its particular iconography and mood. The danger concealed in deep water.

–Her tears weren’t of despair, bt of relief.

–In the renewed silence, the flashlight beam sprang up, and Vannessa reappeared, the light goulishly striking her face.

–Louisa’s discomfort would be worth it, for the telling of it.

–He learned of the ridged caste system, which categorized citizens based on the political behavior of their parents, aunts, and even grandparents.

–A river is not moving ceaselessly into the future, but a stagnated pool. Breathing at its surface, drowning in its depths are the same.

–The rupture of its invalidation has left a void she can’t fill, She lived and he lived, and their shared history is a void.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

susanchoi.com

Susan Choi (born 1969) is an American novelist. She is the author of several acclaimed novels, including The Foreign Student (1998), American Woman (2003), and Trust Exercise (2019), which won the National Book Award for Fiction.

Early life and education[edit]

Born in 1969 in South Bend, Indiana, to a Korean father and a Jewish mother, Choi attended public schools. When she was nine years old, her parents divorced. She and her mother moved to Houston, Texas, where she attended the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.[1] Choi earned a B.A. degree in Literature from Yale University (1990) and an M.F.A. from Cornell University.[2]

Career[edit]

Play video

File:Susan_Choi_2019_National_…

Choi at the 2019 National Book Festival

After receiving her graduate degree, she worked for The New Yorker as a fact checker. At this job she met her husband, Pete Wells; they separated in 2016 but continue to share a house in Brooklyn and co-parent their two sons.[3][4][2]

Choi published her first novel, The Foreign Student, in 1998. It won the Asian American Literary Award for Fiction and was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Award.[citation needed] In 2000, she edited (with David Remnick) Wonderful Town: New York Stories from The New Yorker, an anthology of short fiction.

Her second novel, American Woman (2003), was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in literature.[5] In 2010, she won the PEN/W.G. Sebald Award for A Person of Interest, which was also a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award in 2009.[6]

In 2014, her fourth novel, My Education, won the Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Fiction.[7]

As of May 2018, Choi was working on a novel employing conventions of memoir and reportage that “takes up the question of national identity, and the extent to which it coincides or does not coincide with ethnic and with cultural identity.”[8] In 2019, she published her fifth novel, Trust Exercise, which won the National Book Award for Fiction.[9]

In 2025, Choi published her sixth novel, Flashlight.[10][11][12][13][14][15][16] It was longlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize.[17]

Choi teaches creative writing at the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars.[18] Her work appeared in the New York Review of Books.[19]

Awards and grants[edit]

• Asian American Literary Award for Fiction for The Foreign Student

• Steven Turner Award for The Foreign Student

• National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship recipient (2001)

• Guggenheim Fellow (2004).

• PEN/W.G. Sebald Award (2010) for A Person of Interest

• Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Fiction for My Education (2014)[20]

• National Book Award for Fiction for Trust Exercise (2019)[21]

• Sunday Times Short Story Award (2021) for Flashlight[22]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Flashlight: a novel DB129795

Choi, Susan. Reading time: 17 hours, 56 minutes.

Read by Wong, Eunice.

Family

Asian American Topics

“One night, Louisa and her father take a walk on the beach. He’s carrying a flashlight. He cannot swim. Later Louisa is found washed up by the tide, barely alive. Her father is gone. She is ten years old. In chapters that shift from one member to the next, turning back again and again to that night by the sea, Susan Choi’s Flashlight chases the shockwaves of one family’s catastrophe. Louisa is an only child of parents who have severed themselves from the past. Her father, Serk, an ethnic Korean born and raised in Japan, lost touch with his family when they bought into the promises of postwar Pyongyang and relocated to the DPRK. Her American mother, Anne, is estranged from her family after a reckless adventure in her youth. And then there is Tobias, Anne’s illegitimate son, whose reappearance in their lives will have astonishing consequences. What really happened to Louisa’s father? Why did he take Louisa and her mother to Japan just before he disappeared? And how can we love, or make s

Downloaded: September 1, 2025

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Kate’s 2¢: “Playground” by Richard Powers

“Playground” by Richard Powers

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Robin Siegerman, Edoardo Ballerini, Kevin R Free, Pun Bandhu, Eunice Wong, Krys Janae did a good job of individually narrating the various characters in this story.

   Impressive as this was, I get a bit confused when the author jumps around from present to past to future. I’m not sure of the time line for when Raffie died, because at the end he and Ina were both on the island to greet Todd.

   I wonder if the author used an outline, storyboard, or some other technique to keep track of people, places, and things.

   I did enjoy the challenge as I read (listened) to this story.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.richardpowers.net

Richard Powers (born June 18, 1957) is an American novelist whose works explore the effects of modern science and technology. His novel The Echo Maker won the 2006 National Book Award for Fiction.[1][2] He has also won many other awards over the course of his career, including a MacArthur Fellowship. As of 2024, Powers has published fourteen novels and has taught at the University of Illinois and Stanford University. He won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Overstory.

Life and work[edit]

Early life[edit]

One of five children, Powers was born in Evanston, Illinois, the son of Richard Franklin Powers and his wife Donna Powers (née Belik).[3] His family later moved a few miles west to Lincolnwood, where his father was a local school principal. When Powers was 11, they moved to Bangkok, Thailand, where his father had accepted a position at International School Bangkok, which Powers attended through his freshman year, ending in 1972. During that time outside the U.S., he developed skills in vocal music and proficiency in cello, guitar, saxophone, and clarinet. He also became an avid reader, enjoying nonfiction primarily and classics such as the Iliad and the Odyssey.

The family returned to the U.S. when Powers was 16. Following graduation in 1975 from DeKalb High School in DeKalb, Illinois, he enrolled at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (UIUC) with a major in physics, which he switched to English literature during his first semester. He earned a BA in 1978 and an MA in Literature in 1980. He decided not to pursue a PhD partly because of his aversion to strict specialization, which had been one reason for his early transfer from physics to English, and partly because he had observed in graduate students and their professors a lack of pleasure in reading and writing (as portrayed in Galatea 2.2).[citation needed]

Professorships and awards[edit]

In 2010 and 2013, Powers was a Stein Visiting Writer at Stanford University, during which time he partly assisted in the lab of biochemist Aaron Straight.[4][5]

Powers was named a MacArthur Fellow in 1989. He received a Lannan Literary Award in 1999.

Powers was appointed the Swanlund Professor of English at UIUC in 1996, where he is currently an emeritus professor.[6]

On August 22, 2013, Stanford University announced that Powers had been named the Phil and Penny Knight Professor of Creative Writing in the Department of English.[7]

Powers’ deeply moving and brilliantly original novel.”[24]

Playground (2024), the 14th novel by Powers, was longlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize.[25]

From NLS/BARD/LOC”

Playground: a novel DB124700

Author: Powers, Richard

Reading Time: 13 hours, 52 minutes

Read by: Robin Siegerman, Edoardo Ballerini, Kevin R Free, Pun Bandhu, Eunice Wong, Krys Janae

Subjects: Psychological Fiction, Science Fiction

“Twelve-year-old Evie Beaulieu sinks to the bottom of a swimming pool in Montreal strapped to one of the world’s first aqualungs. Ina Aroita grows up on naval bases across the Pacific with art as her only home. Two polar opposites at an elite Chicago high school bond over a three-thousand-year-old board game; Rafi Young will get lost in literature, while Todd Keane’s work will lead to a startling AI breakthrough. They meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, whose deposits of phosphorus once helped to feed the world. Now the tiny atoll has been chosen for humanity’s next adventure: a plan to send floating, autonomous cities out onto the open sea. But first, the island’s residents must vote to greenlight the project or turn the seasteaders away.” — book jacket Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

New York, NY : Spotify Audiobooks, [2024]

Take Action On Playground: a novel

Kate’s 2¢: “Vanished: the sixty-year search for the missing men of World War II” by Will S. Hylton

“Vanished: the sixty-year search for the missing men of World War II” by Will S. Hylton

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Tom Burch did a good job of reading this very important story.  Why didn’t our government find these warriors? If this isn’t already a documentary for everyone to view, it should be.

   Thank you to the man who persevered to find the three B24 bombers, numerous downed planes, and brought the heros home after 60-years.

   I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wil S. Hylton is an American journalist. He is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine[1] and has published cover stories for The New Yorker,[2] Rolling Stone,[3] Esquire,[4] Harper’s,[5] Details, GQ,[6] New York,[7][8] Outside,[9] and many others.

Early life and education[edit]

Hylton was born in Baltimore, Maryland and attended Baltimore City College high school. He enrolled in Kenyon College for a year before being expelled.[10]

Career[edit]

Hylton began publishing articles in The Baltimore Sun as a teenager,[11] and was writing for major magazines by his early twenties.[3][12][4] In 1999 he bicycled across Cuba for Esquire,[13] climbed the Ecuadorean Andes for Details, and wrote about Hugh Hefner for Rolling Stone.[14]

At 24, Hylton was hired as a Contributing Editor at Esquire, where he wrote about the invasion of Afghanistan,[15] attempts to patent the human genome,[16] and the prosecution of alleged nuclear spy Wen Ho Lee.[17] After the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Hylton became a Washington Correspondent for GQ, publishing criticism of the war[18][19] and drafting articles of impeachment for Dick Cheney.[20][21] He was the first journalist to interview Joe Darby, the whistleblower at Abu Ghraib prison.[22]

Hylton was hired by The New York Times Magazine as a Contributing Writer in 2010.[1] In October 2011, Hugo Lindgren, editor of The New York Times Magazine, wrote, “By now you should know that when you see Wil’s byline on a piece, it doesn’t really matter what it’s about. Just read it.”[23] Hylton has written for the magazine about bioterrorism,[24] the search for Air France Flight 447,[25] the influence of Breitbart News,[26] and the prosecution of police officers after the death of Freddie Gray.[27] His February 8, 2015 article about the family detention policy to imprison Central American women and children[28] was cited by a federal judge in an injunction to suspend the policy two weeks later.[29] His 2016 profile of the painter Chuck Close was a finalist for the National Magazine Award in Feature Writing.[30]

In 2018, Hylton stated on The Daily that he was conducting secret interviews with the Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López, who at the time was under house arrest.[31][32]

Hylton is a recipient of the John Bartlow Martin Award for Public Interest Journalism by the Medill School of Journalism[33] and his articles have been anthologized in the books “Best Political Writing,” “Best Music Writing,” and “Best Business Stories.”[34] He is a Special Lecturer at Johns Hopkins University[35] and a member of the faculty at the MFA program in creative nonfiction at Goucher College.[36]

Personal life[edit]

Hylton lives in Baltimore; he is divorced with two children.[37]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Vanished: the sixty-year search for the missing men of World War II DB79116

Author: Hylton, Wil S.

Reading Time: 9 hours, 56 minutes

Read by: Tom Burch

Subject: History

Journalist details the search for a United States bomber which crashed in the Pacific Ocean in 1944. Traces the last mission of the crew, the rumors and innuendos which followed their disappearance, and the recovery of the remains from the crash in 2008. 2013.

New York : Riverhead Books, 2013.

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Kate’s 2¢: “The Tenant” by Freida McFadden

“The Tenant” by Freida McFadden

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Will Damron and  Christine Lakin did a great job of narrating this well-crafted story.

   This suspenseful tale kept me listening straight through. The ending was perfect irony.

A few take-aways:

–You’re supposed to dress for the interviewIt was a relief to be a productive member of society.

–If she needs space, you need to give it to her.

–If I’d taken that advice, none of this would be happening.

–Tell him the truth…My mother thought I was a sociopath.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.freidamcfadden.com

Freida McFadden (born May 1, 1980) is an American thriller author and practicing physician specializing in brain injury. Freida McFadden is a pseudonym.

Biography[edit]

From New York City, McFadden attended Harvard University as an undergraduate. She practices medicine in the Boston area.[2]

McFadden self-published her first book through Amazon KDP in 2013. Her 2022 book The Housemaid was an international bestseller.[3] A film adaptation of the novel is in production for Lionsgate, with Rebecca Sonnenshine writing the screenplay, and Hidden Pictures’ Todd Lieberman and Alex Young producing.[4] It is directed by Paul Feig, and the cast includes Sydney Sweeney as Millie, Amanda Seyfried as Nina, Brandon Sklenar as Andrew, Michele Morrone as Enzo. Filming began in January 2025, and it is scheduled to be released on December 25, 2025.[5]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The tenant DB129492

McFadden, Freida. Reading time: 8 hours, 52 minutes.

Read by Damron, Will; Lakin, Christine.

Mystery and Detective Stories

Suspense Fiction

“There’s no place like home… Blake Porter is riding high, until he’s not. Fired abruptly from his job as a VP of marketing and unable to make the mortgage payments on the new brownstone he shares with his fiancée, he’s desperate to make ends meet. Enter Whitney. Beautiful, charming, down-to-earth, and looking for a room to rent. She’s exactly what Blake’s looking for. Or is she? Because something isn’t quite right. The neighbors start treating Blake differently. The smell of decay permeates his home, no matter how hard he scrubs. Strange noises jar him awake in the middle of the night. And soon Blake fears someone knows his darkest secrets… Danger lives right at home, and by the time Blake realizes it, it’ll be far too late. The trap is already set. #1 New York Times bestselling author Freida McFadden knocks at your door with a gripping story of revenge, privilege, and secrets turned sour…”– From publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

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Kate’s 2¢: “The driving machine: a design history of the car” by Witold Rybczynski

“The driving machine: a design history of the car” by Witold Rybczynski

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Lyle Blaker

 Did a good job of reading this brief history of the car. When I saw this title among the seven books on one cartridge sent to my by NLS, I though: ho hum. Cars. However, I found I actually enjoyed learning about how the cars I’ve heard of and the cars I used to drive came into existence.  I never knew that Mercedes was his daughter’s name.

   I hope the print copy had a lot of pictures of the old cars, up to the date of publication.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Early life[edit]

Rybczynski was born in Edinburgh of Polish parentage and raised in Surrey, England, before moving at a young age to Canada. He attended Loyola College in Montreal. He received Bachelor of Architecture (1966) and Master of Architecture (1972) degrees from McGill University in Montreal.[1][2]

Career[edit]

Rybczynski has written around 300 articles and papers on the subjects of housing, architecture, and technology, many of which are aimed at a non-technical readership. His work has been published in a wide variety of magazines, including The Wilson Quarterly, The Atlantic Monthly, and The New Yorker.[3] From 2004 to 2010, he was architecture critic for Slate.[4]

He taught at McGill University (1974–1993) and the University of Pennsylvania (1993–2012), and served on the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts from 2004 to 2012.[5] He now lives in Philadelphia and is Emeritus Professor of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania. He was married to Shirley Hallam, who died in 2021.[6]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The driving machine: a design history of the car DB125640

Rybczynski, Witold Reading time: 6 hours, 46 minutes.

Lyle Blaker

Science and Technology

“In this lively and entertaining work, Witold Rybczynski–hailed as “one of the best writers on design working today” by Publishers Weekly–tells the story of the most distinctive cars in history and the artists, engineers, dreamers, and gearheads who created them. Delving into more than 170 years of ingenuity in design, technology, and engineering, he takes us from Carl Benz’s three-wheel motorcar in 1855 to the present-day shift to electric cars. Along the way, he looks at the emergence of mass production with Henry Ford’s Model T; the Golden Age of American car design and the rise of car culture; postwar European subcompacts typified by the Mini Cooper; and the long tradition of the streamlined and elegant sports car. Rybczynski explores how cars have been reflections of national character (the charming Italian Fiat Cinquecento), icons of a subculture (the VW bus for American hippies), and even emblems of an era (the practical Chrysler minivan). He explains key developments in automotive technology, including the electric starter, rack-and-pinion steering, and disc brakes, bringing to light how the modern automobile is the result of more than a century of trial and error. And he weaves in charming accounts of the many cars he’s owned and driven, starting with his first–the iconic Volkswagen Beetle.”– Provided by publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

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Kate’s 2¢: “Never Flinch: A Novel” by Stephen King                      

“Never Flinch: A Novel” by Stephen King               

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Jessie Mueller did a good job of narrating this lengthy book.  I like to parse how the author seems to start with several threads, then brings them together in a perfectly woven narrative. Adding a little zinger at the very end.  Masterly done, Mr. King.

   I think Mr. King read the acknowledgements at the end of the book. At least, that is the voice I’ll now associate with the author.

A few take-aways:

–The church of the Crashed and Burned

–You have to push through to the bitter end. No flintching.

–Once you’re over the line, you can never come back.

–If you’re in it too deep to turn around, it’s no good fooling yourself.

–Killing isn’t the thrill. Rish is becoming the thrill.

–It doesn’t matter if it’s booze…the bottom: it’s always the disease of addiction.

–Mixing religion with politics is dangerous…It leads to Fashisim.

–Money talks. Truth walks.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author. Dubbed the “King of Horror”,[2] he is widely known for his horror novels and has also explored other genres, among them suspense, crime, science-fiction, fantasy, and mystery.[3] Though known primarily for his novels, he has written approximately 200 short stories, most of which have been published in collections.[4]

His debut, Carrie (1974), established him in horror. Different Seasons (1982), a collection of four novellas, was his first major departure from the genre. Among the films adapted from King’s fiction are Carrie (1976), The Shining (1980), The Dead Zone and Christine (both 1983), Stand by Me (1986), Misery (1990), The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Dolores Claiborne (1995), The Green Mile (1999), The Mist (2007), and It (2017). He has published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman and has co-written works with other authors, notably his friend Peter Straub and sons Joe Hill and Owen King. He has also written nonfiction, notably Danse Macabre (1981) and On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (2000).

Among other awards, King has won the O. Henry Award for “The Man in the Black Suit” (1994) and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller for 11/22/63 (2011). He has also won honors for his overall contributions to literature, including the 2003 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters,[5][6] the 2007 Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America[7] and the 2014 National Medal of Arts.[8] Joyce Carol Oates called King “a brilliantly rooted, psychologically ‘realistic’ writer for whom the American scene has been a continuous source of inspiration, and American popular culture a vast cornucopia of possibilities.”[9]

Early life and education

King was born in Portland, Maine, on September 21, 1947. His father, Donald Edwin King, a traveling vacuum salesman after returning from World War II, was born in Indiana with the surname Pollock, changing it to King as an adult.[10] King’s mother was Nellie Ruth King (née Pillsbury).[11] His parents were married in Scarborough, Maine, on July 23, 1939. They lived with Donald’s family in Chicago before moving to Croton-on-Hudson, New York.[12] King’s parents returned to Maine towards the end of World War II, living in a modest house in Scarborough. He is of Scots-Irish descent.[13]

When King was two, his father left the family. His mother raised him and his older brother David by herself, sometimes under great financial strain. They moved from Scarborough and depended on relatives in Chicago, Illinois; Croton-on-Hudson; West De Pere, Wisconsin; Fort Wayne, Indiana; Malden, Massachusetts; and Stratford, Connecticut.[14] When King was 11, his family moved to Durham, Maine, where his mother cared for her parents until their deaths. After that, she became a caregiver in a local residential facility for the mentally challenged.

King says he started writing when he was “about six or seven, just copying panels out of comic books and then making up my own stories … Film was also a major influence. I loved the movies from the start. So when I started to write, I had a tendency to write in images because that was all I knew at the time.”[15] Regarding his interest in horror, he says “my childhood was pretty ordinary, except from a very early age, I wanted to be scared. I just did.”[16] He recalls showing his mother a story he copied out of a comic book. She responded: “I bet you could do better. Write one of your own.” He recalls “an immense feeling of possibility at the idea, as if I had been ushered into a vast building filled with closed doors and had been given the key to open any I liked.”[17] King was a voracious reader in his youth: “I read everything from Nancy Drew to Psycho. My favorite was The Shrinking Man, by Richard Matheson—I was 8 when I found that.”[18]

King’s aunt Gert paid him a quarter for every story he produced; his surviving earliest works include “Jhonathan and the Witchs”, which he wrote at the age of nine.[19]

King asked a bookmobile driver, “Do you have any stories about how kids really are?” She gave him Lord of the Flies. It proved formative: “It was, so far as I can remember, the first book with hands—strong ones that reached out of the pages and seized me by the throat. It said to me, ‘This is not just entertainment; it’s life or death.’… To me, Lord of the Flies has always represented what novels are for, why they are indispensable.”[20] He attended Durham Elementary School and entered Lisbon High School in Lisbon Falls, Maine, in 1962.[1] He contributed to Dave’s Rag, the newspaper his brother printed with a mimeograph machine, and later sold stories to his friends. His first independently published story was “I Was a Teenage Grave Robber”, serialized over four issues of the fanzine Comics Review in 1965. He was a sports reporter for Lisbon’s Weekly Enterprise.

File:Hampden_Academy

In 1971, King worked as a teacher at Hampden Academy.

In 1966, King entered the University of Maine at Orono on a scholarship. While there, he wrote for the student newspaper, The Maine Campus, and found mentors in the professors Edward Holmes and Burton Hatlen.[21][22][23] King participated in a writing workshop organized by Hatlen, where he fell in love with Tabitha Spruce.[22] King graduated in 1970 with a Bachelor of Arts in English, and his daughter Naomi Rachel was born that year. King and Spruce wed in 1971.[1] King paid tribute to Hatlen: “Burt was the greatest English teacher I ever had. It was he who first showed me the way to the pool, which he called ‘the language pool, the myth-pool, where we all go down to drink.’ That was in 1968. I have trod the path that leads there often in the years since, and I can think of no better place to spend one’s days; the water is still sweet, and the fish still swim.”[22]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Never flinch: a novel DB130236

King, Stephen. Reading time: 14 hours, 49 minutes.

Read by Mueller, Jessie.

Bestsellers

Occult and Horror Fiction

Suspense Fiction

“When the Buckeye City Police Department receives a disturbing letter from a person threatening to “kill thirteen innocents and one guilty” in “an act of atonement for the needless death of an innocent man,” Detective Izzy Jaynes has no idea what to think. Are fourteen citizens about to be slaughtered in an unhinged act of retribution? As the investigation unfolds, Izzy realizes that the letter writer is deadly serious, and she turns to her friend Holly Gibney for help. Meanwhile, controversial and outspoken women’s rights activist Kate McKay is embarking on a multi-state lecture tour, drawing packed venues of both fans and detractors. Someone who vehemently opposes Kate’s message of female empowerment is targeting her and disrupting her events. At first, no one is hurt, but the stalker is growing bolder, and Holly is hired to be Kate’s bodyguard–a challenging task with a headstrong employer and a determined adversary driven by wrath and his belief in his own righteousness. Featuring

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Kate’s 2¢: “The Child Garden: A Novel” by Catriona McPherson

“The Child Garden: A Novel” by Catriona McPherson

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Faith Potts did a good job of narrating this well-crafted ‘who dunnit” story. It was an intricate plot with a surprise ending, at least it surprised me.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Catriona McPherson (born 22 October 1965, in South Queensferry)[1] is a Scottish writer. She is best known for her Dandy Gilver series. Her novels have won an Agatha Award, two Anthony Awards, six Lefty Awards, and two Macavity Awards.

McPherson received a Master of Arts degree in English Language and Linguistics and Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics, both from the University of Edinburgh. Before committing herself to writing full-time in 2005, McPherson worked in banking, libraries, and academia.[1]

She remained in Scotland until 2010 when she moved to California.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The child garden: a novel DB92002

McPherson, Catriona. Reading time: 9 hours, 31 minutes.

Read by Faith Potts. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.

Suspense Fiction

Mystery and Detective Stories

Psychological Fiction

The care home where Gloria’s son, who has a neurological disorder, resides used to be the site of an alternative school that closed after a student’s suicide. Now a childhood friend who attended that school needs Gloria’s help–someone from that time is stalking him. Strong language and some violence. 2015.

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Kate’s 2¢: “The Child: A Novel” by

“The Child: A Novel” by       

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   The multiple readers did a great job of narrating this well-crafted story. Even I didn’t realize the solution to the conundrum until Kate also knew it.

From the web:

Fiona Barton is a British author, formerly a journalist for major national newspapers, known for psychological thrillers including the New York Times bestsellers The Widow and The Child, and her recent novel Talking to Strangers. Her career in journalism, where she covered criminal cases, informed her later career as a novelist, allowing her to draw on her experiences to explore the lives of those affected by extraordinary events. Madeleine Milburn Literary Agency

Born in Cambridge, Fiona currently lives in Sussex and south-west France.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The child: a novel DB88619

Barton, Fiona. Reading time: 11 hours, 30 minutes.

Read by Rosalyn Landor; Jean Gilpin; Mandy Williams; Katharine McEwan; Steve West.

Suspense Fiction

Psychological Fiction

As an old house is demolished in a gentrifying section of London, a workman discovers a tiny skeleton, buried for years. As journalist Kate Waters investigates, she unearths connections to a crime that rocked the city decades earlier. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2017.

Downloaded: August 19, 2025

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Kate’s 2¢: “Hidden Star” by Nora Roberts

“Hidden Star” by Nora Roberts

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Kristin Allison did a good job of narrating this sensual story. Nora Roberts certainly knows how to keep up the sexual tension.

   Remind me not to down-load only one in a trilogy of books. I never seem to get to the next one or keep them in order.

Nora Roberts, born Eleanor Marie Robertson on October 10, 1950, is a highly successful and prolific American author known for her romance novels. She is also known for writing crime novels under the pen name J.D. Robb. She began writing when snowed in during a blizzard in 1979 and has since published over 200 books, with many becoming New York Times bestsellers. 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Nora Roberts (born Eleanor Marie Robertson on October 10, 1950) is an American author of over 225 novels, known for romance published under her own name.[1] She also writes police procedurals which have elements of science fiction under the name J. D. Robb, and has published as Jill March and (in the U.K.) Sarah Hardesty.

Life and career[edit]

Personal life[edit]

Early years[edit]

Roberts was born on October 10, 1950, in Silver Spring, Maryland, the youngest of five children.[2] Her parents have Irish ancestry, and she has described herself as “an Irishwoman through and through”.[3] Her family were avid readers, so books were always important in her life.[4] Although she had always imagined stories from childhood, Roberts did not write in her youth other than essays for school. She does claim to have “told lies. Really good ones—some of which my mother still believes.”[5] She credits the nuns at her Catholic school for instilling in her a sense of discipline.[5]

Marriages[edit]

During her second year in high school, Roberts transferred to Montgomery Blair High School,[6] where she met her first husband, Ronald Aufdem-Brinke.[7] They married, against her parents’ wishes, in 1968, as soon as she graduated,[8][9] and settled in Boonsboro, Maryland.

Roberts’ husband worked at his father’s sheet-metal business before joining her parents in their lighting company. She gave birth to two sons, Dan and Jason. Roberts would later refer to this time period as her “Earth Mother” years, when she did crafts, including ceramics and sewing her children’s clothes.[8] The couple divorced[10] in 1983.

Roberts met her second husband, Bruce Wilder, a carpenter, when she hired him to build bookshelves in July 1985.[11][12] Her husband owns Turn the Page Books bookstore in Boonsboro[13] and works as an adult content photographer and videographer.[14] The couple also owned the nearby historic Boone Hotel. After it was destroyed by a fire in February 2008, it was restored and reopened as the Inn BoonsBoro in 2009; the suites were inspired by and named for literary romantic couples with happy endings.[15]

She is an ardent baseball fan, having been honored by the local minor league baseball team Hagerstown Suns several times.[16]

Writing career[edit]

She began to write during a blizzard in February 1979. Roberts states that with three feet of snow, a dwindling supply of chocolate, and no morning kindergarten for her two boys, she had little else to do.[17][18] She fell in love with the writing process, and quickly produced six manuscripts[19] which she submitted to Harlequin, the leading publisher of romance novels, but was repeatedly rejected. Roberts says,

I got the standard rejection for the first couple of tries, then my favorite rejection of all time. I received my manuscript back with a nice little note which said that my work showed promise, and the story had been very entertaining and well done. But that they already had their American writer. That would have been Janet Dailey.[20]

Dailey would go on to be embroiled in a plagiarism scandal in which she eventually confessed to stealing some of Roberts’ work.

Roberts once stated: “You’re going to be unemployed if you really think you just have to sit around and wait for the muse to land on your shoulder.”[21] She concentrates on one novel at a time,[22] writing eight hours a day, every day, even while on vacation.[9] Rather than begin with an outline, Roberts instead envisions a key incident, character, or setting.[21] She then writes a short first draft that has the basic elements of a story. Roberts then goes back to the beginning of the novel. The second draft usually sees the addition of details, the “texture and color” of the work, as well as a more in-depth study of the characters. She then does a final pass to polish the novel before sending it to her agent, Amy Berkower.[23]

She often writes trilogies, finishing the three books in a row so that she can remain with the same characters.[24] In the past, her trilogies were all released in paperback, as Roberts believed the wait for hardcover editions was too long for the reader.[4] All her new publications are released in hardcover first and e-book, with paperback editions following.

Roberts does much of her research over the Internet, as she has an aversion to flying.[9]

Pseudonyms[edit]

Nora Roberts[edit]

In 1980, a new publisher, Silhouette Books, formed to take advantage of the manuscripts from the American writers that Harlequin had rejected.[25] Roberts’ first novel, Irish Thoroughbred, was published in 1981, using the pseudonym Nora Roberts, a shortened form of her birth name Eleanor Marie Robertson because she assumed that all romance authors had pen names.[8]

Between 1982 and 1984, Roberts wrote 23 novels for Silhouette,[8] published under various Silhouette imprints: Silhouette Sensation, Silhouette Special Edition and Silhouette Desire, as well as Silhouette Intrigue, and MIRA’s reissue program. In 1985, Playing the Odds, the first novel in the MacGregor family series, was published and was an immediate bestseller.[8]

In 1987, she began writing single title books for Bantam. Five years later she moved to Putnam to write single title hardcovers and original paperbacks,[26] reaching the hardcover bestseller lists with her fourth hardcover release, 1996’s Montana Sky. Roberts has continued to release single-title novels in paperback. She still occasionally writes shorter category romances. Her attachment to the shorter category books stems from her years as a young mother of two boys without much time to read, as she “[remembers] exactly what it felt like to want to read and not have time to read 200,000 words.”[9]

Roberts was featured in Pamela Regis’s A Natural History of the Romance Novel. Regis calls Roberts “a master of the romance novel form”, because she “has a keen ear for dialogue, constructs deft scenes, maintains a page-turning pace, and provides compelling characterization.”[20] Publishers Weekly once talked about her “wry humor and the use of different narrators, two devices that were once rarities” in the romance novel genre.[9]

J. D. Robb[edit]

Roberts had long wanted to write romantic suspense in the vein of Mary Stewart, but, at the urging of her agent, she concentrated on classic contemporary romance while she built a following of readers.[9] After moving to Putnam in 1992, the publishing company quickly realized that they were unable to keep up with Roberts’s prolific output. They suggested that she adopt a second pseudonym so they would be able to publish more of her work each year.[24]

Her agent, Amy Berkover, convinced the publishers to allow Roberts to write romantic suspense under the new name.[9] She chose the pseudonym D. J. MacGregor, but right before publication, discovered it was in use by another author.[17] Instead, her first romantic suspense novel was published in 1995 under the pseudonym J. D. Robb. The initials “J. D.” were taken from her sons, Jason and Dan, while “Robb” is a shortened form of Roberts.

As J. D. Robb, Roberts has published a series of futuristic science fiction police procedurals. These books, all part of the in Death series, feature detective Eve Dallas and her husband Roarke and are set in a mid-21st century New York City. Despite the emphasis on solving a crime in each of the books, the overall theme of the series is the development of the relationship between Eve and Roarke.[24] When the in Death series began, neither Roberts nor her publisher acknowledged that she was the author. They hoped to allow the series to stand on its own merits and build its own following.[27]

After publishing 18 novels in the in Death series, Putnam published the nineteenth, Divided in Death, first in hardcover. The book became Roberts’ first bestselling novel of 2004.[28]

As of March 2022, Roberts has published 54 novels plus ten novellas in the in Death series.[29]

Other pseudonyms[edit]

Roberts wrote a story for a magazine titled Melodies of Love under the pseudonym Jill March.[17] She has also been known as Sarah Hardesty in the UK. When the Born In series was released in Britain it carried that name instead of Nora Roberts. She has since changed publishers.[17]

Success[edit]

In 1996, Roberts passed the hundred-novel mark with Montana Sky and, in 2012, doubled that with The Witness. In both 1999 and 2000, four of the five novels that USA Today listed as the best-selling romance novels of the year were written by Roberts. Her first appearance on The New York Times Best Seller list came in 1991,[22] and between 1991 and 2001, she had 68 New York Times Bestsellers, counting hardbacks and paperbacks.[30] In 2001, Roberts had 10 best-selling mass-market paperbacks, according to Publishers Weekly, not counting those books written under the J.D. Robb name. In September 2001, for the first time Roberts took the numbers 1 and 2 spots on the Publishers Weekly bestseller list, as her romance Time and Again was number one, and her J.D. Robb release Seduction in Death was number two.[31]

Since 1999, every one of Roberts’s novels has been a New York Times bestseller, and 124 of her novels have ranked on the Times bestseller list, including 29 that debuted in the number-one spot. As of January 24, 2013, Roberts’s novels had spent a combined 948 weeks on The New York Times Best Seller list, including 148 weeks in the number-one spot. As of January 9, 2009, 400 million copies of her books are in print, including 12 million copies sold in 2005 alone. Her novels have been published in 35 countries.[32]

A founding member of the Romance Writers of America (RWA), Roberts was the first inductee in the organization’s Hall of Fame.[9] In 1997 she was awarded the RWA Lifetime Achievement Award, which in 2008 was renamed the RWA Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award.[33] As of 2012, she has won an unprecedented 21 of the RWA’s RITA Awards, the highest honor given in the romance genre.[34]

Two of Roberts’ novels, Sanctuary and Magic Moments, had previously been made into TV movies. In 2007, Lifetime Television adapted four Nora Roberts novels into TV movies: Angels Fall starring Heather Locklear, Montana Sky starring Ashley Williams, Blue Smoke starring Alicia Witt, and Carolina Moon starring Claire Forlani. This was the first time that Lifetime had adapted multiple works by the same author.[35] Four more films were released on four consecutive Saturdays in March and April 2009. The 2009 collection included Northern Lights starring LeAnn Rimes and Eddie Cibrian, Midnight Bayou starring Jerry O’Connell, High Noon starring Emilie de Ravin, and Tribute starring Brittany Murphy.

TIME named Roberts one of their 100 Most Influential People in 2007, saying she “has inspected, dissected, deconstructed, explored, explained and extolled the passions of the human heart.”[36] Roberts was one of only two authors on the list, the other being David Mitchell.[36]

Victim of plagiarism[edit]

In 1997, another best-selling romance writer, Janet Dailey, admitted to repeatedly plagiarizing Roberts’ work. The practice came to light after a reader read Roberts’ Sweet Revenge and Dailey’s Notorious back-to-back; she noticed several similarities and posted the comparable passages on the Internet. Calling the plagiarism “mind-boggling”, Roberts sued Dailey.[9] Dailey acknowledged the plagiarism and attributed it to a psychological disorder. She admitted that both Aspen Gold and Notorious lifted heavily from Roberts’ work. Both of those novels were pulled from print after Dailey’s admission.[37][38] In April 1998, Dailey settled the case. Roberts donated the settlement to various literary causes including the Literacy Volunteers of America (now ProLiteracy).[9][39][40][41]

Roberts joined the chorus strongly criticizing fellow romance writer Cassie Edwards, who had lifted many passages from much older sources (many in the public domain) without giving credit, forcing Edwards out of the business.[42][43]

In 2019, Roberts, along with other authors, was a victim of plagiarism by Cristiane Serruya.[44][45][46]

Charity[edit]

Roberts has been included repeatedly on the Giving Back Fund’s annual lists of the most philanthropic celebrities, with the bulk of her donations going to the Nora Roberts Foundation.[47][48][49] The foundation financially supports organizations that promote literacy and the arts, assist children and engage in humanitarian efforts. The Foundation also endowed the Nora Roberts Center for American Romance at McDaniel College, which supports academic scholarship on the American romance novel, with special emphasis on the literary qualities and significance of the romance.[50]

Works[edit]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Hidden star DB127136

Roberts, Nora. Reading time: 5 hours, 48 minutes.

Read by Allison, Kristin.

Romantic Suspense

Suspense Fiction

Romance

“Private eye Cade Parris takes one look at the beautiful blond who walks unannounced into his office and falls in love. Unfortunately, Bailey James is there to hire him. Fragile and clearly vulnerable, she doesn’t even know who she is. Nor does she know why she’s carrying a tote bag filled with more than a million dollars in cash, a pistol, and a priceless blue diamond.”– From publisher. Some strong language and some explicit descriptions of sex.

Downloaded: August 19, 2025

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