Sarah Can't Stop Reading

I love audiobooks and listen to so many each month. I love being able to get book time in when I’m at the grocery store or folding laundry. Here are three I gave FIVE STARS January – March of 2024. 

Bluff by Michael Kardos

Thank you once again to Amy Allen Clark @momadvice for selecting yet another under the radar Five Star read for her monthly book discussion! Bluff by Michael Kardos was such a mind-blowing, intense mystery that I could not, would not stop listening.

27-year-old Natalie Webb was a famous magician by the age of 17, earning first place at the World of Magic competition at 18 and then never reaching such fame and success again. Now she has mounting bills and a desperate need for cash. She decides to try and write a feature magazine article on the art of cheating at cards. She meets a dazzling card cheat and is pulled into a heist that could earn millions of dollars. But stakes are high and who exactly is cheating whom? And the twists keep coming. I didn’t know I’d be so into a book about magic and poker, but I was and I’ve been thinking about the story and twists ever since. The writing and pacing was fabulous. Mystery readers, this is a must. And it is especially wonderful on audio as it’s read by Julia Whelan.

The White Lady by Jacqueline Winspear

The White Lady introduces another extraordinary sleuth from Jacqueline Winspear, author of the Maisie Dobbs series, which I discovered last year and love so much. I listened to this and could not stop–it was gripping!

Elinor White is a former wartime operative of both WWI and WWII and determined now to live an anonymous life in Shacklehurt, a village in Kent, England. That is until she’s drawn into helping the local family of Jim Mackie. Jim is a son from the Mackie crime family and has tried to make a clean break from their doings, but the Mackie family insists that Jim must return. They aren’t afraid to use force on Jim and even his wife Rosie and child Susie. Despite the protests from Scotland Yard, Elinor dives deep into the Mackie family to protect her neighbors and what she uncovers is both shocking and healing.

This story travels back and forth in time between both wars and takes us from Elinor as a child in Belgium to Elinor as an adult in London. I remember exactly where I was on my walk when I came to the ending of the book. I am pretty sure my mouth was hanging wide open. Jacqueline Winspear is an amazingly talented author and I recommend this five star read to fans of historical fiction and historical mysteries.

Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman

I listened to this using my library’s @libby.app and loved it. I immediately put the print copy on hold so I could review it again and make some notes.

“Rejecting the futile modern fixation on “getting everything done,” Four Thousand Weeks introduces readers to tools for constructing a meaningful life by embracing finitude, showing how many of the unhelpful ways we’ve come to think about time aren’t inescapable, unchanging truths, but choices we’ve made as individuals and as a society—and that we could do things differently.”

This was simply terrific. It was hopeful and thoughtful, with humor sprinkled out. It asks important questions that I’m still thinking about. Highly recommend to those of us who love our to-do-lists and getting things done.