David Baldacci wrote a SERIOUS Novel

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Strangers in Time: A World War II Novel (2025) is excellent historical fiction.

I’m surprised as Baldacci is mainly know for best selling suspense novels and legal thrillers that you immediately forget once getting to the last page.

But his 2025 book is serious literature. This could be nominated for major awards.

… set in London in 1944, about a bereaved bookshop owner and two teenagers scarred by the Second World War, and the healing and hope they find in one another. 

Fourteen-year-old Charlie Matters is up to no good, but for a very good reason. Without parents, peerage, or merit, he steals what he needs, living day-to-day until he’s old enough to enlist to fight the Germans. After barely surviving the Blitz, Charlie knows there’s no telling when a falling bomb might end his life. 

Fifteen-year-old Molly Wakefield has just returned to a nearly unrecognizable London. One of millions of children to have been evacuated to the countryside Molly has been away from her home for nearly five years. Her return, however, is not the homecoming she’d hoped for as she’s confronted by a devastating reality: neither of her parents are there. 

Without guardians and stability, Charlie and Molly find an unexpected ally and protector in Ignatius Oliver, and solace at his bookshop …

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Farewell Parksville, Vancouver Island

On By Rick McIn McCharles family, photos, travel, video4 Comments

I’m moving back to Calgary … or — more accurately — going on the road full-time. In fact, I’m en route to Indonesia today.

Rob & Yvonne sold the house in Parksville where my parents lived their last years.

It was a perfect retirement home for them.

I’d been spending a lot more time in Parksville over recent years helping out my folks.

But Dad died in March.

Mom died in May.

Dad originally wanted to move to the left coast for fishing.

Mom for the weather, gardening, and … bocce ball.

A few years after my parents, my brother Rob and his wife Yvonne decided to move to Parksville, as well. They bought a 2nd house. AND got married in that Parksville home.

Randy and Val made long trips from Calgary, especially enjoying the annual Sandcastle Building competition and LIVE music at the Park.

I was born and raised in Calgary, the high prairie. Ocean and rain forest were a big attraction for me.

Most mornings, I’d get up for dawn and take coffee down to Rathtrevor Beach.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Evenings, I’d often walk down to Parksville Beach at dusk.

Mom played a lot of tiles. And then cards, as her vision worsened over the years.

The most popular addition to town was Charlie during COVID.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Climate is mild in Parksville, year round. You can walk and cycle every day of the year.

Surprisingly, Dad wanted to get an electric trike in 2019. That was fun. Rob and Yvonne later got 2 electric motorcycles.

We did get a few days of snow each year.

I’ll definitely miss Parksville, B.C.

A great lifestyle.

The McCharles family first came here in the 1960s on family summer vacation. We’d park the homemade camper right on the beach.

I’d taken morning coffee at Rathtrevor beach over 2,000 days over the years. This was my last. Quite overcast after the first hard rain in weeks.

The Sicilian Inheritance by Jo Piazza

On By Rick McIn books, travelLeave a comment

Jo Piazza is a novelist, journalist, and podcaster.

I read The Sicilian Inheritance (2024) mainly because I‘ve never been to Sicily. An unforgivable oversight on my part.

It kept me going. Both the modern day story of Sara, there for the first time. AND the story of her great-grandmother Serafina in the bad, old days when women were treated like chattel ➙ kept me going.

I’d almost place this book in the Romance genre.

Sara Marsala barely knows who she is anymore after the failure of her business and marriage.

On top of that, her beloved great-aunt Rosie passes away, leaving Sara bereft with grief.

But Aunt Rosie’s death also opens an escape from her life and a window into the past by way of a plane ticket to Sicily, a deed to a possibly valuable plot of land, and a bombshell family secret.

Rosie believes Sara’s great-grandmother Serafina, the family matriarch who was left behind while her husband worked in America, didn’t die of illness as family lore has it . . . she was murdered.

Thus begins a twist-filled adventure that takes Sara all over the picturesque Italian countryside as she races to solve a mystery and learn the story of Serafina—a feisty and headstrong young woman in the early 1900s thrust into motherhood in her teens, who fought for a better life not just for herself but for all the women of her small village. Unsurprisingly the more she challenges the status quo, the more she finds herself in danger.

Piazza wrote this fictional novel inspired by the real life murder of her great, great grandmother, Lorenza Marsala, more than a 100 years ago. 

Death Benefits by Thomas Perry

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Good book.

Death Benefits (2001) has a terrific premise.

A careful, methodical young data analyst for a California insurance company, John Walker knows when people will marry, at what age they will most likely have children, and when they will die.

All signs point to a long successful career—until Max Stillman, a gruff security consultant, appears without warning at the office.

It seems a colleague with whom Walker once had an affair has disappeared after paying a very large death benefit to an impostor.

Stillman wants to find and convict her; Walker is convinced the woman is innocent.

Now Walker teams up with Stillman on an urgent north-by-northeast race …

I enjoy learning about how skiptracers work and think.

The Left-handed Twin by Thomas Perry

On By Rick McIn books, hikingLeave a comment

The Left-handed Twin (2021) by Thomas Perry is good, but not as good as the previous 8 books in the series.

One part I did enjoy was a chase on Maine’s Hundred Mile Wilderness.

Jane Whitefield helps people disappear.

Fearing for their lives, fleeing dangerous situations, her clients come to her when they need to vanish completely—to assume a new identity and establish a new life somewhere they won’t be found. …

… Jane finds a young woman fresh from LA with a whole lot of trouble behind her. After she cheated on her boyfriend, he dragged her to the home of the offending man and made her watch as he killed him. She testified against the boyfriend, but a bribed jury acquitted him, and now he’s free and trying to find and kill her.

Jane agrees to help, and it soon becomes clear that outsmarting the murderous boyfriend is not beyond Jane’s skills. But the boyfriend has some new friends: members of a Russian organized crime brotherhood.

When they learn that Sara is traveling with a tall, dark-haired woman who disappears people, the Russians become increasingly interested in helping the boyfriend find the duo. They’ve heard rumors that such a woman existed—and believe that, if forcibly extracted, the knowledge she has of past clients could be worth millions.  

He does plan a 10th book to be called The Tree of Life and Flowers (2026).

“I See You’ve Called in Dead” by John Kenney

On By Rick McIn books, philosophyLeave a comment

Mixed feelings.

I downloaded “I See You’ve Called in Dead” (2025) for the intriguing premise:

Obituary writer Bud Stanley is semi-depressed. One night he gets drunk and posts his own obituary.

His company assumes he is dead and removes him from their employees list.

Turning up at work, the computer won’t let them fire Bud because he’s technically dead in their system. 😀

Catch-22.

I love it.

And there is a lot of humour. I laughed out loud more than once.

Thurber Prize-winner and New York Times bestselling author John Kenney tells a funny, touching story about life and death, about the search for meaning, about finding and never letting go of the preciousness of life.

Suspended from work, Bud meets a woman and they start attending wakes and funerals of strangers.

There are some interesting philosophical discussions about the meaning of life. Important.

Two additional characters really appeal: Leo, a neighbour’s son, and Bud’s best friend Tim.

So … plenty of good content. But ultimately I’m not sure I can call this book a success. I nearly quit several times.

my iPhone 16 Pro

On By Rick McIn Apple, product endorsementsLeave a comment

Quality is much better than my last phone, the 13 Mini.

Image generated by Ideogram.AI

In fact, I find the 16 Pro better at both photos and video than my current action camera.

It’s my primary camera now.

5x optical zoom is almost enough for my purposes. 😀

Detective Aunty by Uzma Jalaluddin

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Great title for a cozy mystery.

It kept me going right to the end. Never sure of which suspect was the real killer.

Uzma Jalaluddin is a Canadian writer and teacher. She also writes a column for the Toronto Star.

This one is an Agatha Christie set in the South Asian Muslim immigrant community.

When her grown daughter is suspected of murder, a charming and tenacious widow digs into the case to unmask the real killer in this twisty, page-turning whodunnit …

Sana, phones to say that she’s been arrested for killing the unpopular landlord of her clothing boutique.

Determined to help her child, Kausar heads to Toronto for the first time in nearly twenty years. …

With the help of some old friends and her plucky teenage granddaughter, Kausar digs into the investigation to uncover the truth.

Because who better to pry answers from unwilling suspects than a meddlesome aunty?

But even Kausar can’t predict the secrets, lies, and betrayals she finds along the way…

5-STAR REVIEW: DETECTIVE AUNTY by Uzma Jalaluddin

Themes included murder, affairs, fraud, pyramid schemes, theft, racism, gentrification.

Dim Sum of All Fears by Vivien Chien

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I liked the 1st book in the series — Death by Dumpling — so carried on with Dim Sum of All Fears. A great title. 😀

Another short, easy read. A cozy mystery. Almost Young Adult. 

Lana Lee is a dutiful daughter, waiting tables at her family’s Chinese restaurant even though she’d rather be doing just about anything else.

Then, just when she has a chance for a “real” job, her parents take off to Taiwan, leaving Lana in charge.

Surprising everyone―including herself―she turns out to be quite capable of running the place.

Unfortunately, the newlyweds who just opened the souvenir store next door to Ho-Lee have turned up dead. . .and soon Lana finds herself in the midst of an Asia Village mystery.

I’ll likely carry on to the 3rd book in the Noodle Shop mysteries series.



Lifebeat – the alternative friendship Newsletter 😀

On By Rick McIn friends, humourLeave a comment

Well kids … there was a time before the internet when friends used something called a telephone to keep in touch. Once in a while we’d write letters. It’s true.

Ron and Kate took the time to put together friendship newsletters called The Calgary Redeye. They collected contributions from friends and put it together on a photocopied, stapled publication.

Out in Saskatoon, I decided to launch a goofy competitor to the Redeye. I called it Lifebeat.

Here’s the Christmas 1991 edition. 😀 The goal was to make friends laugh.

click for larger images