Girl with a Gun: An Annie Oakley Mystery by Kari Bovee

From humble beginnings in rural Ohio, Annie becomes a household name when at fifteen she competes in a shooting competition against the renowned marksman Frank Butler. After the event, Colonel Cody, also knows as Buffalo Bill, asks Annie to join the Wild West Show. She is reluctant to leave her family, but is offered a generous salary to help support her family, and Annie Oakley becomes the new star of the travelling Wild West Show.

Along with her beloved horse Buck, Annie settles into the travelling troupe lifestyle and immediately befriends her tent-mate Kimi and her infant daughter Winona. When Kimi is found dead soon after, Annie suspects it wasn’t some tragic accident and begins investigating the matter herself when no one else will. As she investigates, her horse Buck and others around the camp fall ill, and it seems like someone is trying to hurt Annie and her standing in the show. Can she figure out what happened to Kimi and who wants Annie gone before someone else gets hurt?

Kavi Bovee’s Girl with a Gun brings readers right into its historical setting. The name Annie Oakley is recognizable to even the casual American history buff, and all will appreciate the pieces of history sprinkled throughout the story. It should be noted that while Girl with a Gun is based on history, it is still very much a work of fiction. The real-life facts and chronology of Annie’s life are changed or moved around for the sake of the plot. Historical fiction is a genre that has an infinite number of possibilities and Kavi Bovee adds to the genre with a fun mystery series that reimagines a life of a talented young woman.

Bovee does an excellent job setting the scene from the beginning, introducing Annie has a loveable and relatable character with depth. The historical setting is aided further by the addition of fictional news headlines that reflect the events of the story. These headlines add flavor to the drama and underlining mystery the characters face and reflect the public’s opinion of the conflicts within the travelling Wild West Show.

The defining strength of Girl with a Gun is the characterization of Annie. She cares deeply for her family and friends and readers will root for her as she strives to protect those she cares about. Regardless of how historically accurate the character version of Annie is to the real-life Annie, readers will get wrapped up in the trials and tribulations she faces at every turn, including a whirlwind romance.

Kavi Bovee’s Girl with a Gun: An Annie Oakley Mystery is the first of a trilogy of mysteries based on the exciting life of a prolific female sharpshooter. It is a fantastic read for the casual mystery fan and historical fiction reader.

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Savoring the Olde Ways: Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table, by Carole Bumpus

Carole Bumpus is a retired family therapist turned travel writer and culinary memoirist. In her first book of the Savoring the Olde Ways series, Carole takes readers on an intimate food tour of the Champagne, Alsace, Lorraine, and Paris regions of France. After being introduced by a mutual friend, Carole builds a special friendship with Josiane and her mother. Wanting to understand what brings and keeps European families glued together through generations of happiness and hardship, Bumpus begins by interviewing Josiane’s mother. Hearing about traditions passed down and the challenges of cooking during the war, the plan for a culinary tour of France is born among the women. Unfortunately, after travel delays out of their control, Josiane’s mother passes away before they can make the trip. Determined to make a dream trip a reality, Carole and Josiane set off to start a journey of a lifetime in honor of the woman who inspired it all.

The beginning of a trip of a lifetime, Savoring the Olde Ways: Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table, takes readers along on an intimate view into the culinary lives of the people in Northeastern France. Each chapter is full of delicious descriptions of food and heartwarming traditions, where history has had a powerful impact on both. Culture does not stop at borders. Bumpus encounters recipes from Italy and French recipes influenced by Germany cuisine. Following World War II, people from surrounding countries came to France in search of work and brought their traditional recipes with them. The Alsace and Lorraine regions of French went back and forth as being part of France and Germany. Carole and Josiane spend an evening with three generations of a family that experienced this flux of their nationality over the course of a century. Family and tradition helped to keep families strong during troublesome times in history.

The French have a reputation for being rude, but Carole finds everyone she meets to be nothing but warm and inviting. Each home the women visit, the residents are eager to share their recipes, memories, and traditions. Josiane brings Carole to the regions she and her family grew up in and they take part in the long tradition of Sunday family dinner. Traditions like this are becoming less common in modern culture, but it is very important to the families who are keeping it alive. The importance and similarity of the family traditions that Bumpus encounters shows that we all aren’t that different.

Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table is only the beginning of a rich leisurely tour through France. Each chapter is full of the warmth of family, mouthwatering food, and the importance of history. The journey continues in Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table: Book Two and Bumpus’s Italian adventure in September to Remember: Searching for Culinary Pleasures at the Italian Table.

Published version

Waltzing a Two-Step by Dan Juday

Dan Juday’s memoir Waltzing A Two-Step is a humble and compassionate look at his formable years. Born a few years after the second world war, Dan experiences a peaceful and happy childhood in rural Indiana, moving frequently before the family settles on a rural area of land named Springwood in Clinton County, Indiana. The Juday family were devout Catholics and enrolled Dan and his siblings in Catholic schools until the move to Springwood made public school the only option. There Dan does his best to fit in but his status as a minority catholic in a mostly protestant community in the 1950s brings its own challenges. For Dan, his struggles don’t stop there. From a young age, he knew there was something inherently different from himself that didn’t align with what the world around him expected, and as he gets older and enters adolescence, it becomes increasingly difficult to ignore.

By the time Dan reaches college, the country is facing a lot of cultural changes from the growing political and racial tensions of the 1960s. Young men around him without deferments are being drafted to fight in Vietnam. As he progresses through his undergraduate courses, Dan continues to struggle with finding his place in the world and finding a suitable partner his family would approve of. Almost by fate, a counselor suggests he switch his minor to Spanish. Dan soon finds a sense of belong with a group of international students and soon decides to study abroad in Spain. While at the airport, he meets a fellow student named Ricky and embraces the growing desire to live truthfully in a world that is still a long way from being accepting.

Waltzing A Two-Step is a unique memoir in that Dan’s thoughts and feelings are rarely the focus. He uses his ability as a strong observer to tell his story through the people and places that surrounded him in his life. Through his quiet observation of the world, he sees the simplicity of life growing up, but as the 1960s bring large cultural shifts, Dan has his simple worldview increasingly challenged. His struggle to find a sense of belonging is a quintessential part of adolescence and emulates that complex experience throughout the memoir. Dan’s journey of self-acceptance of his sexuality will also be relatable to any reader who has experienced similar challenges.

Juday focuses on the themes of family, faith, and self. He dedicates a section of the book to each with a final one, tying them all together as a sort of reckoning. One thing that really stood out while reading Waltzing A Two-Step was how people who maybe only be there for a brief moment in your life can have some of the biggest affects in the end. The most beautiful and often bittersweet moments of the book are people that are only there in passing. The best example being the immigrant family that live in the apartment above Dan in New Jersey and welcome him into their family when he needed one. It’s a beautiful message about life to embrace the people around you and treasure them as you journey through the trials of life.

Dan Juday’s Waltzing A Two-Step: Reckoning Family, Faith, and Self is a coming-of-age memoir that is a must-read. A compassionate journey of self-acceptance that follows Dan Juday from the rural communities of Indiana, across Europe, and among the East Coast searching for a life well lived.

Published version