Will Dean states in the acknowledgements at the end of his tense thriller Adrift that the characters he wrote in the novel were incredibly real to him and that he hopes he did them justice. He adds that from the very beginning he was fearful for Peggy and Samson, both of the narrators. This is part of what makes Will Dean masterful at his craft - his investment into his characters. It shows. Drew and Peggy live on a houseboat on a canal in middle America with their t

This is the fourth in a string of funny books I've picked up quite inadvertantly, however joyously. Sandwich by Catherine Newman is a bitesize treat of a reading experience. Rocky is at a Cape Cod beach house for the week with her family. Her grown kids have joined her and her husband Nick, and her elderly parents will come halfway through the week as well. The title refers to Rocky's age, sandwiched right between her children and her parents. The protagonist

Emma Rosenblum seems to have her finger on the pulse of the affluent in New York City, as demonstated in her enjoyable novel Mean Moms . Centering around a group of parents who have their children enrolled in the exclusive private school Atherton Academy, Mean Moms amuses with its hilarious and scathing portrait of the uber wealthy. Belle, Morgan, and Frost are the "it" moms at Atherton, revelling in their top positions as the popular parents. New mom Sofia appears on

Liann Zhang's Julie Chan Is Dead is an imaginative tale of a fictional (I hope!) dark underbelly of social media. This novel was wickedly fun and a quick read. Julie and Chloe Chan are twins that were separated at age four when their parents died. Chloe was adopted by an affluent white family and Julie was taken in by their evil, vindictive aunt. Twenty-something Julie now has a dead-end job at a supermarket while Chloe is a highly paid, massively influencial social