If You Like This, Try That Reviewlettes

 Remember when I used to talk about books instead of frantically trying to get rid of them before moving?  I figure I can marry up these two pursuits by reviewing some books that have been spending a bit too long on my desk.  I've got two great books to tell you about today, both of which put me in the mind of a couple of my favorite TV shows.  If you like your books to occasionally complement your TV-watching habit, today's post is for you! ;-)

 If you like Orange is the New Black, try....

Gonzalez and Daughter Trucking Co. by Maria Amparo Escandon - Libertad Gonazalez, ironically, is in Mexican prison.  Even more ironically, it's the first time she's ever had female friends and a home that's not on wheels.  Finding an unlikely family in the cells of the Mexicali Penal Institution for Women with its bizarre class structure and warden with a heart of gold, Libertad still finds it difficult to tell the story of her life and crime to the women that surround her, so she unconsciously decides to read it to them.  Pretending to read the library's books to her fellow inmates at her newly established Library Club, Libertad shares the tale of her life with her father, a man on the run from the Mexican authorities who drives truck to keep them off his trail, even though they became an imaginary threat long ago.  Escandon weaves a charming, unique modern day fairy tale of Libertad's parents' love story, her rootless life on the road with an overprotective dad, and the love she found that made her so desperate to leave life on the road behind that she ends up in prison.  Gonzalez and Daughter is a clever read about a woman who has to go to prison to find freedom.  Bonus points because the prison community comes to life and definitely smacks of the uneasy camaraderie found among the inmates on Orange is the New Black.  Definitely give this one a try!

If you like Criminal Minds, try...

The Killer Next Door by Alex Marwood - I thought The Killer Next Door was a fascinating combination of literary fiction and mystery with a super-creepy serial killer that only a Criminal Minds fan could love.  Marwood's book brings the denizens of sketchy South London house full of pay by the month flats dramatically to life.  There's an immigrant, a runaway, an elderly woman unwilling to part with her rent control, a woman on the run from a moment in the wrong place at the wrong time, and, oh yeah, there's the normal looking guy that's actually a serial killer hard at work mummifying the remains of his kills within the confines of his flat.  If you're looking for a thrill a minute, twisty sort of book that you won't be able to put down, this might not be it.  It's no difficult task to guess the killer.  However, The Killer Next Door is a convincing story of how a houseful of strangers with secrets becomes a family, united against their scumbag landlord, all with a side of perfectly twisted serial killer.  I loved these characters, was taken in by the fringe of society where they exist, and loved the black humor that added a little levity to a dark story that doesn't end up seeming so dark at all. I love Alex Marwood's unique deeper take on the traditional crime thriller and look forward to whatever she comes up with next.

(Thanks to the publisher for my copy of The Killer Next Door in exchange for review consideration.  Gonzalez and Daughter is from my own stacks.)

The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood

It's time to retrieve an oldie but a goodie from the vault of books that I should have read and reviewed a long time ago but didn't.  Today's selection is The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood.  Back in high school when I was making the transition from kids' books to "grown-up" books, I was way into crime fiction.  As I got a little older, I switched over to being more of a "literary" fiction fan, but there are parts of me that remember that craving for a good crime thriller, and when an offer of The Wicked Girls came across my radar, I was excited to read a good crime story that had been "literaturized" a little.  The more literary aspects of this book definitely gave me what I came for, but, much to my surprise, the mystery itself kind of disappointed.  This review is pretty much impossible to write without a light spoiler or two (that the jacket copy spoils anyway), so tread carefully, spoiler haters. ;-)

The action of The Wicked Girls starts in the seaside town of Whitmouth where Amber Gordon works as the supervisor of the third shift cleaning crew at Funnland, a beachfront amusement park.  Amber is trying to be the kind of supportive supervisor people like, helping them out when she can and turning a blind eye to their minor infractions.  Her life is pretty no frills, but her luck; finding a home with a good boyfriend, her two sweet dogs, and steady work; never ceases to surprise her.  That is, until the night when she reports to her normal cleaning duties at Innfinityland, the hall of mirrors, and discovers the body of a strangled young girl in its passages.  All the sudden, her criminal past, carefully buried and obscured by a new name and a quiet life, comes perilously close to the surface. 

As the killings continue, and the Seaside Strangler begins to make a name for himself, the press descends upon the lower-end holiday town. With it comes Kirsty Lindsay,  mother of two, hack journalist, and the incognito other half of a "criminal" duo.  Kirsty and Amber were never meant to see each other again, but the coincidence of the Whitmouth crimes drags them into each other's orbit for the first time since the fateful day when their childhoods came to an abrupt end. As the saga of the Seaside Strangler continues, the back story of the "Wicked Girls" also slowly unspools.

I actually quite enjoyed The Wicked Girls, but it wasn't quite what I was expecting.  For starters, it was set on the English seaside, which for some reason, despite having read the spoilery jacket copy and whatever the publicist sent me when pitching the book to me for review, I failed to realize.  As for me, the British slang and atmosphere set this book a little apart for me and made me like it more.  Second, I was expecting more of a nailbiter when it came to identifying the Seaside Strangler. However, for anybody who has ever caught an episode of a show like Criminal Minds in their lives, spotting the Strangler was no difficult task, and I think I'd managed it before the book was half over.  Rather than giving a lot of attention to the immediate crimes at hand, the book uses them to embrace its more literary side and delve into the psyches of the now adult perpetrators of a childhood crime. 

As a character study, The Wicked Girls soars.  It asks difficult questions about what constitutes a murder, whether a killer can ever outrun the effects of their crime, and how well another person and their motives can ever truly be known.  More suspenseful than the Strangler mystery by far is the collection of flashbacks that recalls the details of the first and last day the Wicked Girls spent together and the crime, if you can call it that, that derails their futures.  Marwood does a stellar job with her two main characters.  They are are never quite positioned as wholly loveable women, but Marwood easily draws your sympathy toward them as she lays out the paths that each took to live a good life in the wake of crime and punishment, whether it was by being a devoted wife and mother or by always offering a helping hand to a friend or a co-worker in need.  When it becomes clear that what's past is never truly past, Marwood evokes a sad situation and asks her readers to consider what really makes a person wicked and whether someone with blood on their hands can ever find redemption.    

(Review copy received from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.)