{"id":3018,"date":"2019-03-15T14:48:57","date_gmt":"2019-03-15T21:48:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=3018"},"modified":"2019-03-16T03:58:25","modified_gmt":"2019-03-16T10:58:25","slug":"maureen-jennings-heat-wave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/maureen-jennings-heat-wave\/","title":{"rendered":"Maureen Jennings: Heat Wave"},"content":{"rendered":"

This book is available on April 30, 2019.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The prolific Maureen Jennings begins a new series with Heat Wave<\/em>, set in 1936 Toronto, which is experiencing a particularly brutal heat wave.\u00a0 The main character is young Charlotte Frayne, a fledgling private eye who works for the usually unflappable Thaddeus Gilmore.\u00a0 When she arrives at work the day the book opens, though, Mr. Gilmore has received a particularly nasty piece of hate mail, and he hurries off.<\/p>\n

When he\u2019s away, several things happen.\u00a0 One of them is that owner of the nearby Paradise Caf\u00e9 comes by and asks Gilmore and associates to look into some theft going on at his restaurant. The other is a call from Mr. Gilmore, informing Charlotte that his wife has been taken to the hospital, the victim of some type of attack.<\/p>\n

Disturbed, Charlotte never the less agrees to turn up at the Paradise Caf\u00e9 to train for a waitressing shift as she feels going undercover may help her to find the culprit.\u00a0 Jennings has long been an expert at setting a stage, baiting her hook, and creating memorable characters who come to life on the page, and this new series proves to be no different in that regard from her other novels.<\/p>\n

And early on, an old friend shows up \u2013 Inspector Murdoch, though it\u2019s 1936, and it\u2019s Jack Murdoch, son of the beloved Thomas.\u00a0 It seems appropriate though, as Jennings pulls the reader into a new era in Toronto, that she bring some of the past along as well.\u00a0 I was glad to see him.<\/p>\n

The threads of the novel are complex, but Jennings has a sure hand, and they are never confusing.\u00a0 Mr. Gilmore is arrested for the attack on his wife, and so along with sorting out matters at the Paradise Caf\u00e9, Charlotte is also trying to exonerate her boss. She\u2019s also worrying about a new lady friend of her grandfather\u2019s, a humorous and gentle sidebar.<\/p>\n

For me, the heart of the book was the Paradise, run by four WWI vets who bonded when they were all kept in the same prison camp.\u00a0 The war has left different marks on all four, but they support each other and with the Paradise, they are trying to make sure no one in their little slice of Toronto goes hungry \u2013 that no one starves, as they were kept starving in their prison camp. The first meal Charlotte helps to serve is called \u201cCamp Day\u201d complete with \u201cwar\u201d bread.<\/p>\n

Several years ago we were lucky enough to host Ms. Jennings at our book store and she had the concept for this novel in mind.\u00a0 One of the central themes is how the Paradise got its name, which is from the food that takes you back to Paradise.\u00a0 The meal that when you think of it, brings back so many happy, safe memories, you are in effect back home.\u00a0 When Maureen described this to the audience at the store I think all of us were thinking of a favorite meal prepared by our mothers or grandmothers, and when one of the characters talks about why he loves cream, that\u2019s the heart of the novel.<\/p>\n

Jennings is unusual among historical novelists in that she doesn\u2019t write about the titled or privileged, she instead writes about the everyday people that surely we would have been were we to live in whatever time period she is describing.\u00a0 Along with telling a great story, she also manages to almost re-create a place.\u00a0 I felt I had been to 1936 Toronto after I finished this wonderful book.\u00a0 A wonderful story, well told \u2013 highly recommended.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This book is available on April 30, 2019. The prolific Maureen Jennings begins a new series with Heat Wave, set in 1936 Toronto, which is experiencing a particularly brutal heat wave.\u00a0 The main character is young Charlotte Frayne, a fledgling private eye who works for the usually unflappable Thaddeus Gilmore.\u00a0 When she arrives at work … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[10,82,7,83,84],"class_list":["post-3018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-historical","tag-maureen-jennings","tag-p-i","tag-toronto","tag-wwi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3018"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3021,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3018\/revisions\/3021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}