Smorgasbord Posts from my Archives – Previous Reviews 2021 – #Family # Murder #Mystery – Going Home by Sharon Marchisello

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Over the next few weeks I will be sharing my reviews for books I posted between July and December 2021.

Good books deserve to be showcased on a regular basis and I hope that it might entice you to either move the books up your groaning TBR’s or add the books to its burden!

I have been reading Going Home.. a family, murder mystery by Sharon Marchisello this week and here is my five star review.

About the book

Michelle DePalma expected to jet into Two Wells, Texas, check on her elderly mother, and hurry back to her orderly life in Atlanta, where she has a happy marriage and satisfying career. Instead, she finds her mother, Lola Hanson, hovered over the bludgeoned body of her caregiver, Brittany Landers.

Since the events of 9/11, one month earlier, Lola’s memory loss has amplified, and the family suspects Alzheimer’s. Now Lola can’t tell anyone what happened to Brittany.

The agency that provides home care for Lola promptly withdraws its services. Michelle is stuck in her home town longer than planned as she cares for a mother with whom she has never been close and tries to prove her innocence. The police officers who investigate the crime are old antagonists from grade school. A secret thought to be long buried–that Michelle bore a son out of wedlock and gave him up for adoption–surfaces when a surprise daughter-in-law and granddaughter show up, distracting Michelle from her quest to solve the murder. And then she stumbles upon a motive which makes Lola look even more guilty.

Going Home was inspired by the author’s mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s and explores the challenge of solving a murder mystery when a potential witness cannot rely on her memory. Written from the perspective of a baby boomer forced to reverse roles with her parents, it crosses into the mainstream genre of women’s fiction

My review for the book 30th September 2021

This is a well written and thought provoking story that combines a care crisis that many of us face with elderly parents who have developed dementia, and the unravelling of the mystery surrounding a murder in a family home.

It is clear the author has experience of the challenge of communicating with someone who has short term memory loss, and brings in a cleverly crafted murder plot with plenty of twists and turns to keep the reader interested.

There are flashbacks to the past and events which have a bearing on the present, and the reader is witness to the fallout that revelations result in as the search begins for a viable suspect amongst the outsiders who have access to the family home. It would seem that the authorities have only one suspect in mind, and without the ability to communicate coherently, an elderly woman must rely on her extended family to prove her innocence.

The author does a great job in keeping all the various strands of the plot running smoothly in parallel and brings the story to a satisfactory climax.

I recommend to those who enjoy well written murder mysteries and family sagas.

Read the reviews and buy the book: Amazon US –  And: Amazon UK

Also by Sharon Marchisello

Read the reviews and buy the books: Amazon US – and: Amazon UK – follow Sharon: Goodreads – blog: Sharon Blogspot – Twitter: @SLMarchisello

About Sharon Marchisello

Sharon Marchisello is the author of two mysteries published by Sunbury Press, Going Home (2014) and Secrets of the Galapagos (2019). She is an active member of Sisters in Crime.

She contributed short stories to anthologies Shhhh…Murder! (Darkhouse Books, 2018) and Finally Home (Bienvenue Press, 2019). Her personal finance book Live Well, Grow Wealth was originally published as Live Cheaply, Be Happy, Grow Wealthy, an e-book on Smashwords. Sharon has published travel articles, book reviews, and corporate training manuals, and she writes a personal finance blog called Countdown to Financial Fitness.

She grew up in Tyler, Texas, and earned her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Houston in French and English. She studied for a year in Tours, France, on a Rotary scholarship and then moved to Los Angeles to pursue her Masters in Professional Writing at the University of Southern California.

Retired from a 27-year career with Delta Air Lines, she lives in Peachtree City, Georgia, doing volunteer work for the Fayette Humane Society and the Fayette County Master Gardeners UGA Extension.

 

Thanks very much for dropping in today and I hope you have enjoyed my review of Sharon’s book and will head over to buy a copy… thanks Sally.

39 thoughts on “Smorgasbord Posts from my Archives – Previous Reviews 2021 – #Family # Murder #Mystery – Going Home by Sharon Marchisello”

  1. Pingback: Smorgasbord Weekly Round Up – October 31st – November 6th 2022 – Hits 1940s, Tony Bennett, Spiritual Awareness, Poetry, Podcast, Book Reviews, Health and Humour | Smorgasbord Blog Magazine

  2. Congratulations, Sharon. It was wonderful to get to know you better. Thank you, Sally, for featuring Sharon and sharing your lovely review. 😊

    Liked by 2 people

  7. Thanks for the great reshare of your review, Sally! It’s a very timely and also heart touching story. Congratulations to Sharon! Sorry, it seems the pandemic had brought some amnesia on some book presentation to me. But we are having Sally the successor of the Bibliotheca of Alexandria. hugsx Michael

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  10. Quite an intriguing plot. I found the comment about Sharon coming up with this idea after dealing with her mother’s issues with Alzheimer’s quite interesting.

    I typically visited Mom twice a week in her assisted living home, but it was always a bit of a leap of faith each time I left. I don’t mean to imply something nefarious was going on, but I never knew what would happen in the meantime. Her hearing aids would go missing and mysteriously return a month later. I’d walk in and find her wearing someone else’s glasses.

    Liked by 3 people

    • I enjoyed the book very much and I know what you are talking about with regard to your mother’s possessions. My mother had to go into hospital and they put on a ward the deemed was for vulnerable elderly. I went in the next morning as they encouraged family to be there most of the time to keep the patients calm. I found my mother is a dreadful state because the woman in the bed next to her had taken all her belongings in the night and was lying on her bed in my mother’s dressing gown, slippers and holding her toiletry bag. It took some persuading to get everything back by two nurses as she was adamant they were hers. Very confusing for them. xxx

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      • I’m so sorry to read that about your mom, Sally. Being in the hospital, especially combined with drugs intended to calm a person down, can be terribly confusing for the elderly. Are you familiar with the condition called Sundowner’s Syndrome? Seeing my mom in such an emotional state of confusion was quite alarming.

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      • I am familiar with the term and I believe it is linked to Vitamin D deficiency as I noticed my mother improved overall slightly when I gave her a supplement but definitely in the evenings.. along with some additional hydration. It is a combination of things obviously but tiredness and input overload from the day are also contributory factors.. Very disconcerting for those who love them as it is hard to say or do anything to alleviate the stress for them.. xx

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      • Great point about the staff, Sharon. Most are overworked and must manage an impossible situation. There are some fabulous caregivers, though I saw others firsthand who were untrained and didn’t have the right personality for the job.

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      • It is part of the dementia spectrum Sharon but the symptoms are particularly apparent in the evenings and add to the general confusion.. I wondered with my mother’s if it was to do with going to sleep as I know she was terrified of not waking up and would get agitated – there are a lot of elements involved.. hugs

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