Primadonna

Fine Young People: A Novel by Anna Bruno

2025-07-25T23:31:00.001-04:00

Fine Young People: A Novel by Anna Bruno
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Fantastic. 4.5 stars. Would've been 5 stars but (view spoiler)

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Midnight in Soap Lake A Novel by Matthew Sullivan | Blog Tour:Excerpt

2025-04-14T02:50:00.003-04:00

A lake with mysterious properties. A town haunted by urban legend. Two women whose lives intersect in terrifying ways. Welcome to Soap Lake, a town to rival Twin Peaks and Stephen King’s Castle Rock.

When Abigail agreed to move to Soap Lake, Washington for her husband’s research she expected old growth forests and craft beer, folksy neighbors and the World’s Largest Lava Lamp. Instead, after her husband jets off to Poland for a research trip, she finds herself alone, in a town surrounded by desert, and haunted by its own urban legends.

But when a young boy runs through the desert into Abigail’s arms, her life becomes entwined with his and the questions surrounding his mother Esme’s death. In Abigail’s search for answers she enlists the help of a recovering addict-turned-librarian, a grieving brother, a broken motel owner, and a mentally-shattered conspiracy theorist to unearth Esme’s tragic past, the town’s violent history, and the secret magic locked in the lake her husband was sent there to study.

As she gets closer to the answers, past and present crimes begin to collide, and Abigail finds herself gaining the unwelcome attention of the town’s unofficial mascot, the rubber-suited orchard stalker known as TreeTop, a specter who seems to be lurking in every dark shadow and around every shady corner.

A sweeping, decade-spanning mystery brimming with quirky characters, and puzzle hunt scenarios, Midnight in Soap Lake is a modern day Twin Peaks—a rich, expansive universe that readers will enter and never forget.

Abigail

Something was there.

An animal, Abigail was certain, loping in the sagebrush: a twist of fuzz moving through the desert at the edge of her sight. The morning had already broken a hundred. Her glasses steamed and sunscreen stung her eyes—

Or maybe she hadn’t seen anything.

Yesterday, while walking along this desolate irrigation road, she’d spotted a cow skull between tumbleweeds, straight out of a tattoo parlor, but when she ran toward it, bracing to take a picture to send to Eli across the planet—proof, perhaps, that she ever left the house—she discovered it was just a white plastic grocery bag snagged on a curl of sage bark.

Somehow. Way out here.

The desert was scabby with dark basalt, bristled with the husks of flowers, and nothing was ever there.

When Eli first told her he’d landed a grant to research a rare lake in the Pacific Northwest, Abigail thought ferns and rain, ale and slugs, Sasquatch and wool.

And then they got here, to this desert where no one lived. Not a fern or slug in sight.

This had been the most turbulent year of her life.

Eleven months ago, they met.

Seven months ago, they married.

Six months ago, they moved from her carpeted condo in Denver to this sunbaked town on the shores of Soap Lake, a place where neither knew a soul.

Their honeymoon had lasted almost three months—Eli whistling in his downstairs lab, Abigail unpacking and painting upstairs—and then he kissed her at the airport, piled onto a plane, and moved across the world to work in a different lab, on a different project, at a different lake.

In Poland.

When she remembered him lately, she remembered photographs of him.

The plan had been to text all the time, daily calls, romantic flights to Warsaw, but the reality was that Eli had become too busy to chat and seemed more frazzled than ever. This week had been particularly bad because he’d been off the grid on a research trip, so every call went to voicemail, every text into the Polish abyss. And then at five o’clock this morning, her phone pinged and Abigail shot right out of a drowning sleep to grab it, as if he’d tossed her a life preserver from six thousand miles away.

And this is what he’d had to say:

sorry missed you. so much work & my research all fd up. i’ll call this weekend. xo e

As she was composing a response—her phone the only glow in their dark, empty home—he added a postscript that stabbed her in the heart like an icicle.

P.S. maybe it time since remember using time to figure out self life?

What kind of a sentence was that? And what was a “self life” anyway?

Abigail had called him right away. When he didn’t pick up she went down to the lab he’d set up in their daylight basement. She opened a few of his binders with their charts of Soap Lake, their colorful DNA diagrams, their photos of phosphorescent microbes, as cosmic as images from deep space. She breathed the papery dust of his absence and tried to imagine he’d just stepped out for a minute and would be back in a flash, her clueless brilliant husband, pen between his teeth, hair a smoky eruption, mustard stains on the plaid flannel bathrobe he wore in place of a lab coat.

From one of his gleaming refrigerators, Abigail retrieved a rack of capped glass tubes that contained the Miracle Water and the Miracle Microbes collected from the mineral lake down the hill— she sometimes wondered if her limnologist husband would be more at home on the shores of Loch Ness—and held one until a memory arose, like a visit from a friend: Eli, lifting a water sample up to the window as if he were gazing through a telescope, shaking it so it fizzed and foamed. And then he was gone again.

She hated that she did this. Came down here and caressed his equipment like a creep. Next she’d be smelling his bathrobe, collecting hairs from his brush. It was as if she felt compelled to remind herself that Eli was doing important work and, as the months of distance piled up, that he was even real.

Back when they’d first started dating, Abigail had been the busy one, the one who said yes to her boss too much and had to skim her calendar each time Eli wanted to go to dinner or a movie. Of course her job as an administrative assistant in a title insurance office had never felt like enough, but when she mentioned this restlessness to Eli, finding her path—figure out self life—had suddenly become a centerpiece of their move to Soap Lake. But they got here and nothing had happened. It wasn’t just a switch you flipped.

Abigail slid the tall tube of lake water back into its rack. Only when she let go, the tube somehow missed its slot and plunged to the floor like a bomb.

Kapow!

On the tile between her feet, a blossom of cloudy water and shattered glass.

She stood over the mess, clicking her fingernails against her teeth and imagining microbes squealing on the floor, flopping in the air like miniscule goldfish. She told herself, without conviction, it had been an accident.

And then she stepped over the spill, put the rack back in the fridge and, surprised at the immediacy of her shame, went for a walk in this scorching desert.

It stunned her, how harsh and gorgeous it was.

Loneliness: it felt sometimes like it possessed you.

She hadn’t spoken to anyone in over a month, outside of a few people in the Soap Lake service industry. There was the guy who made her a watery latte at the gas station the other morning, then penised the back of her hand with his finger when he passed it over. And the newspaper carrier, an old woman with white braids and a pink cowgirl hat, who raced through town in a windowless minivan. She told Abigail she was one DUI away from unemployment, but the weekly paper was never late. And the cute pizza delivery dude who was so high he sat in her driveway on his phone for half an hour before coming to the door with her cold cheese pizza, saying, Yes, ma’am. Thanks, ma’am, which was sweet but totally freaked her out. And the lady with the painted boomerang eyebrows in the tampon aisle at the grocery store who gave her unwanted advice on the best lube around for spicing up menopause, to which Abigail guffawed and responded too loudly, “Thanks, but I’m not even goddamned forty!”

At least she’d discovered these maintenance roads: miles and miles of gravel and dirt, no vehicles allowed, running alongside the massive irrigation canals that brought Canadian snowmelt from the Columbia River through the Grand Coulee Dam to the farms spread all over this desert. The water gushed through the main canals, thirty feet wide and twenty feet deep, and soon branched off to other, smaller canals that branched off to orchards and fields and ranches and dairies and soil and seeds and sprouts and leaves and, eventually, yummy vital food: grocery store shelves brimming with apples and milk and pizza-flavored Pringles.

Good soil. Blazing sun. Just add water and food was born.

Almost a trillion gallons a year moved through these canals. T: trillion.

All that water way out here, pouring through land so dry it crackled underfoot.

She halted on the road. Pressed her lank, brown hair behind her ear. Definitely heard something, a faint yip or caw.

She scanned the horizon for the source of the sound and there it was again, a smudge of movement in the wavering heat. Something running away.

A few times out here she’d seen coyote. Lots of quail, the occasional pheasant. Once, in a fallow field close to town, a buck with a missing antler that looked from a distance like a unicorn.

Not running away, the smudge out there. Running toward. She was nowhere near a signal yet her instinct was to touch her phone. She craned around to glimpse the vanishing point of the road behind, gauging how far she’d walked and, if things got bad, how far she’d have to run.

Three miles, minimum. Six miles, tops.

Definitely approaching.

Not something. Someone.

A human. Alone.

Running. A boy.

A little boy. Sprinting.

Abigail froze as their eyes met, and suddenly the boy exploded out of the desert, slamming into her thighs with an oof! He wore yellow pajamas and Cookie Monster slippers covered in prickly burrs.

He clung to her legs so tightly that she almost tipped over. When she registered the crusty blood on his chin and cheeks and encasing his hands like gloves, she felt herself begin to cry, scared-to-sobbing in one second flat.

Deep breath. Shirt wipe.

“Hey! Are you hurt? Look at me. Are you hurt?”

The boy wasn’t crying, but his skin was damp and he was panting hot and wouldn’t let go of her legs. She felt a hummingbird inside of his chest.

She knelt in the gravel and unfolded his arms, turning them over at the wrist. She lifted his shirt and spun him around as best she could. He had some welts and scratches from running through the brush, and the knees of his pj’s were badly scuffed, but he wasn’t cut, not anywhere serious, which meant— The blood belonged to someone else.

Matthew Sullivan is the beloved author of Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore, an Indie Next Pick, B&N Discover pick, a GoodReads Choice Award finalist and winner of the Colorado Book Award. He received his MFA from the University of Idaho and has been a resident writer at Yaddo, Centrum, and the Vermont Studio Center. His short stories have been awarded the Robert Olen Butler Fiction Prize and the Florida Review Editors’ Award for Fiction. His writing has been featured in the New York Times Modern Love column, The Daily Beast, and Shelf Awareness amongst others.

Buy Links:

HarperCollins: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/midnight-in-soap-lake-matthew-sullivan?variant=43103022350370

BookShop.org: https://bookshop.org/a/397/9781335041791

Barnes & Noble: http://aps.harpercollins.com/hc?isbn=9781335041791&retailer=barnesandnoble

Amazon: https://www.amazon.ca/s?k=9781335041791&tag=hcg-02-20

Social Links:

Author Website: http://matthewjsullivan.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mickmatthew1/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/matthew.j.sullivan.77/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5690035.Matthew_J_Sullivan

Escape from the Carnival of Horrors (Give Yourself Goosebumps, #1) by R.L. Stine

2022-10-26T20:59:00.001-04:00

Escape from the Carnival of Horrors by R.L. Stine
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Really quick read but just as fun as when I read these type of books as a child. I love Choose-Your-Own-Adventure's so this was of course fun.

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Kristy's Big Day by Gale Galligan

2022-07-28T20:58:00.000-04:00

Kristy's Big Day by Gale Galligan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

★★★☆☆½

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Dawn and the Impossible Three by Gale Galligan

2022-07-03T20:56:00.001-04:00

Dawn and the Impossible Three by Gale Galligan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've always loved how the BSC series speak about serious issues. Reminds me of my childhood love for this series.

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Claudia and Mean Janine by Raina Telgemeier

2022-07-01T20:55:00.001-04:00

Claudia and Mean Janine by Raina Telgemeier
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Really lovely and nostalgic. Made me cry 😭 ❤️

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Mary Anne Saves the Day by Raina Telgemeier

2022-06-26T20:54:00.001-04:00

Mary Anne Saves the Day by Raina Telgemeier
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So much had to be cut and was changed from the original story but it just made this one different and interesting again. Loved the introduction of Dawn and ofc so much love for a strong and loud Mary Anne.!

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The Truth About Stacey by Raina Telgemeier

2022-06-21T20:52:00.001-04:00

The Truth About Stacey by Raina Telgemeier
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Such a great story. It was fun reading this original book as a kid and I forgot so much of the plot that it was like reading it for the first time. I also love the art style.

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Heartstopper: Volume One (Heartstopper, #1) by Alice Oseman

2022-05-17T20:49:00.001-04:00

Heartstopper: Volume One by Alice Oseman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Felt like such a cliffhanger to end like that. Adorable and lovely though.

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A Shot at Normal by Marisa Reichardt

2022-04-30T20:47:00.001-04:00

A Shot at Normal by Marisa Reichardt
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A really really really fantastic novel about a homeschooled teen who wants to make her own decisions about her body. Super realistic and I love that because of the love for her family, it is hard for her to choose to go against her parents and everything that they've engrained in her.

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The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #1) by Rick Riordan

2022-03-14T11:31:00.003-04:00

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I finally see what all the hype was about.
I loved this book. It was really helpful reading the illustrated version too. Although definitely not needed because Rick describes things so well without going overboard with the world building. Just perfect. Hilarious and heartfelt, I can't wait to read more of Percy's adventures.

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Becoming Brave: How to Think Big, Dream Wildly, and Live Fear-Free by Tracey Mitchell

2022-01-29T10:24:00.000-05:00

Becoming Brave: How to Think Big, Dream Wildly, and Live Fear-Free by Tracey Mitchell
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

I received a free copy of the book by the book's publishers via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

From saying that people who deal with injustice need to push through it, to saying that people whose life is in shambles need to not go into depression because it'll only "add to their troubles". I'm so done with this book. But the biggest kicker was (of course I should've seen this coming once I saw it was a Christian self-help book but I held out hope it would be good) was her saying she's not a feminist but instead an "ezer". Which means helper in hebrew. Get me out of here ASAP.!

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Doctor Sleep by Stephen King

2022-01-26T23:23:00.002-05:00

Doctor Sleep by Stephen King
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The sequel to The Shining kept me up late at night scared to turn out the lights and scared to sleep because of nightmares that came from the things I read in this book. I have searched high and low for a book that would scare the shit out of me and I finally found it. There have been some other books that have scared me but never to the point of nightmares and refusing to read it if I were going to be home alone for awhile.

Some of my favorite characters from The Shining return and we get so many amazing new characters, both villians and our heroes, and Stephen truly just writes so damn good and rarely ever misses in his books.

My favorite sequel I have ever read. I loved all the slightly funny parts that got me to breathe again. I loved how strong our new Shiner Abra is.
Now onto watching the movie.

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Joe Hill: The Graphic Novel Collection by Joe Hill

2022-01-03T20:26:00.002-05:00

Joe Hill: The Graphic Novel Collection by Joe Hill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Wow. All together Joe Hill's graphic novel collection was pretty good.! No two stories seemed too much alike and all of them were pretty good in their own way.
The Cape ★★★☆☆½
The Cape: 1969 ★★★☆☆
Thumbprint ★★★★★
Kodiak ★★☆☆☆
Wraith ★★★★★

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Wraith by Joe Hill

2022-01-03T20:24:00.005-05:00

Wraith by Joe Hill
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wraith is a really good, creepy story with really creepy but amazing illustrations.

I really loved all the time jumps and different povs. Christmas has never been so scary.!

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Kodiak by Joe Hill

2022-01-02T21:52:00.002-05:00

Kodiak by Joe Hill
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

A really quick story that wasn't too interesting.

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Thumbprint by Joe Hill & Jason Ciaramella

2022-01-02T21:46:00.002-05:00

Thumbprint by Joe Hill
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A really good story with no hero.

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The Cape: 1969 by Joe Hill & Jason Ciaramella

2022-01-02T21:44:00.004-05:00

The Cape: 1969 by Joe Hill
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Many plot holes and questions unanswered. Characters not fleshed out. 3 stars is being generous because the story was good without everything that was so bad.

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A Home for Hope! by Margie Blumberg

2022-01-01T10:51:00.002-05:00

A Home for Hope! by Margie Blumberg
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I loved this story about kids getting a dog and about a dog being adopted and finding a home. Cute and cozy.

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Finding Om by Rashmi S. Bismark

2022-01-01T10:38:00.004-05:00

Finding Om by Rashmi S. Bismark
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A great way of teaching children about mindfulness, meditation, and mantras. The drawings were too cute.!

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We Laugh Alike / Juntos Nos Reímos: A Story That's Part Spanish, Part English, And A Whole Lot of Fun by Carmen T. Bernier-Grand

2022-01-01T10:29:00.004-05:00

We Laugh Alike / Juntos Nos Reímos: A Story That's Part Spanish, Part English, And A Whole Lot of Fun by Carmen T. Bernier-Grand
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A fun and cute story for bilingual kids or kids who are learning spanish.! Also promoting kids to play together even if there are differences in things such as language.

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My Two Grandads by Floella Benjamin

2021-12-31T23:44:00.004-05:00

My Two Grandads by Floella Benjamin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Aston and his two granddads (his mom's dad and his dad's dad) bring both their bands together to play as one band for his school. This was definitely a nice little story.

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Emmy Noether: The Most Important Mathematician You've Never Heard Of by Helaine Becker

2021-12-31T23:26:00.004-05:00

Emmy Noether: The Most Important Mathematician You've Never Heard Of by Helaine Becker
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
The story of the not well known Emmy Noether. She helped Einsteins theory and created two of her own, one being Noether’s theorem. Her life ended tragically and people don't really know much about her. We need a movie and more books on this amazing woman so that she can get the recognition she truly deserves.! Another amazing children's book from the Kids Can Press publishing company.!

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The Story of Climate Change: A first book about how we can help save our planet by Catherine Barr & Steve Williams

2021-12-31T23:01:00.000-05:00

The Story of Climate Change: A first book about how we can help save our planet by Catherine Barr
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A childrens book about climate change that even adults can learn from.! I really enjoyed the history that this book taught and I learned several things that I didn't know before.! It really amazed me and I think it's a very important read.!

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Stanley at School by Linda Bailey

2021-12-31T21:33:00.002-05:00

Stanley at School by Linda Bailey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

An amazing book for children about dogs who want to find out what kids do at school all day. They find out and have a fun adventure too.!

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