Good Reads

Jump on the running board with the wild Firefly Brothers

I’m always on the hunt for a good story, something that makes me think, or laugh, or wonder about, or engages my brain in some new way – a mystery perhaps, a part of history newly revealed, or new worlds to discover.

“The Many Deaths of the Firefly Brothers” by Thomas Mullen had me We believe there are things engaged from the first that are possible and page. It’s part mystery, part things that are not, actions history with an added touch we can imagine doing and of wonder. Jason Fireson is a others that are beyond novice bootlegger near the pale. But the doors are the end of Prohibition. swung and what once was Driving the backroads and impossible, unthinkable, outwitting the police are is there before us, quite a thrill, but as his happening to us.skills progress, so also do his ambitions. Like robbing banks, “because that’s where the money is!”

The Depression has hit his family hard. Soon his brother Whit has joined Jason. Exhausting the goodwill and bad judgment of old pals, surviving late-night police raids,sneaking through stake-outs ... the Firefly Brothers become the stuff of legends in a country desperate for distraction from real life.

Are the bank-robbing Firefly Brothers out for themselves, or are they do-gooders for the downtrodden? What’s the secret hanging between the brothers, and why is it they can’t be killed?

Plant your feet firmly on the running boards and hang on. – Deb Laslie

You may know characters in this charming southern series

Looking for good southern writing with characters that you feel you already know (because you live next door to them)? Ann B. Ross’ charming “Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind” begins the series featuring Julia Springer.

Miss Julia, recently widowed banker’s wife of 45 years and Men, religious men, had proud member of First been making decisions for Presbyterian, finds her me all my life, telling me life and her community not to worry, do what I tell turned upside down when her dead husband’s you, I know what’s best “lady friend” (Wesley for you, what you want is Lloyd hasn’t been in his not important. And I’d let bank-related meetings them, always assuming every Thursday evening that they were right, that for years?) drops her they knew more than I husband’s 9-year-old son on her doorstep. did, that it was my place

What’s an upstanding to agree and go along, matron to do? What will even as the icy knife of the neighbor’s think? Her resentment cut wider and friends? Her pastor? As deeper into my heart.the prayer-chain phone lines buzz with what will suffice for the latest “concern,” Julia is learning to deal with her inheritance, manage a household that now includes a young boy who desperately needs a haircut, and coming to the realization that her very satisfactory life has not been satisfactory at all. A page-turner. – Deb Laslie