Category Archives: A John Scognamiglio Book

June 26, 2019 · 11:57 pm

Review: The Long Flight Home by Alan Hlad

Title: The Long Flight Home by Alan Hlad
Publisher: A John Scognamiglio Book
Genre: Historical (40s), Fiction
Length: 384 pages
Book Rating: B

Complimentary Review Copy Provided by Publisher

Summary:

Inspired by fascinating, true, yet little-known events during World War II, The Long Flight Home is a testament to the power of courage in our darkest hours—a moving, masterfully written story of love and sacrifice.

It is September 1940—a year into the war—and as German bombs fall on Britain, fears grow of an impending invasion. Enemy fighter planes blacken the sky around the Epping Forest home of Susan Shepherd and her grandfather, Bertie. After losing her parents to influenza as a child, Susan found comfort in raising homing pigeons with Bertie. All her birds are extraordinary to Susan—loyal, intelligent, beautiful—but none more so than Duchess. Hatched from an egg that Susan incubated in a bowl under her grandfather’s desk lamp, Duchess shares a special bond with Susan and an unusual curiosity about the human world.

Thousands of miles away in Buxton, Maine, a young crop-duster pilot named Ollie Evans has decided to travel to Britain to join the Royal Air Force. His quest brings him to Epping and to the National Pigeon Service, where Susan is involved in a new, covert assignment. Codenamed Source Columba, the mission aims to air-drop hundreds of homing pigeons in German-occupied France. Many will not survive. Those that do make the journey home to England can convey crucial information on German troop movements—and help reclaim the skies from the Luftwaffe.

The friendship between Ollie and Susan deepens as the mission date draws near. When Ollie’s plane is downed behind enemy lines, both know how remote the chances of reunion must be. Yet Duchess’s devotion and her singular sense of duty will become an unexpected lifeline, relaying messages between Susan and Ollie as war rages on—and proving, at last, that hope is never truly lost.

Review:

The Long Flight Home by Alan Hlad  is an informative yet poignant novel which takes place during World War II.

In 1940, Susan Shepherd and her grandfather Bertie answer their country’s call to duty when asked to provide homing pigeons for Britain’s latest covert operation. Operation Columba is a clever plan in which hundreds of pigeons will be dropped over France. The hope is French citizens will send the pigeons back to their owners with valuable information detailing Nazi troops within their country.  Susan and Bertie welcome their opportunity to serve their country but Susan cannot help but fear for the safety of their flock. The only pigeon she refuses to send is her hand-raised pigeon, Duchess. With the Nazi bombings of London intensifying, Susan and Bertie anxiously await the return of their pigeons which they hope will provide critical details of the Nazis activities.

In Buxton, ME, Oliver “Ollie” Evans is frustrated by the United States’ refusal to become involved in the war in Europe.  He lives on a farm with his parents and he is an experienced pilot due to his family’s crop dusting business. Following a tragic loss, Ollie is determined to travel to Britain and join the Royal Air Force which consists of other Americans who are helping the RAF.  Despite the difficulties he encounters on his journey, Ollie’s dream is within grasp when  an altercation with RAF Flight Lieutenant Clyde Boar changes his destiny.

Following a serendipitous metting, Ollie is sent to work with Susan and Bertie on their farm.  Forming a fast friendship, their lives take yet another unexpected turn through a series of unanticipated events.  Susan is left to worry about Duchess and Ollie’s safety while at the same time facing an increasingly worrisome crisis with Bertie. Duchess plays a heartwarming role in their lives but will outside forces continue to keep them apart?

The Long Flight Home is an engaging novel that is well-written and educational. The plot is quite unique and highlights a little known yet extremely important mission in which homing pigeons play a vital role in the early years of World War II. Susan, Ollie and Bertie are well-developed and appealing characters that are easy to like and root for. This clever debut by Alan Hlad is well-researched and provides a fascinating peek into an intriguing part of World War II history.

An emotional, riveting novel that I greatly enjoyed and highly recommend.

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Filed under A John Scognamiglio Book, Alan Hlad, Historical, Historical (40s), Rated B, Review, The Long Flight Home

December 20, 2017 · 11:56 pm

Review: The Last Suppers by Mandy Mikulencak

Title: The Last Suppers by Mandy Mikulencak
Publisher: A John Scognamiglio Book
Genre: Historical, Literary Fiction
Length: 304 pages
Book Rating: B+

Complimentary Review Copy Provided by Publisher Through Edelweiss

Summary:

Set in 1950s Louisiana, Mandy Mikulencak’s beautifully written and emotionally moving novel evokes both The Help and Dead Man Walking with the story of an unforgettable woman whose quest to provide meals for death row prisoners leads her into the secrets of her own past.

Many children have grown up in the shadow of Louisiana’s Greenmount State Penitentiary. Most of them—sons and daughters of corrections officers and staff—left the place as soon as they could. Yet Ginny Polk chose to come back to work as a prison cook. She knows the harsh reality of life within those walls—the cries of men being beaten, the lines of shuffling inmates chained together. Yet she has never seen them as monsters, not even the ones sentenced to execution. That’s why, among her duties, Ginny has taken on a special responsibility: preparing their last meals.

Pot roast or red beans and rice, coconut cake with seven-minute frosting or pork neck stew . . . whatever the men ask for Ginny prepares, even meeting with their heartbroken relatives to get each recipe just right. It’s her way of honoring their humanity, showing some compassion in their final hours. The prison board frowns upon the ritual, as does Roscoe Simms, Greenmount’s Warden. Her daddy’s best friend before he was murdered, Roscoe has always watched out for Ginny, and their friendship has evolved into something deep and unexpected. But when Ginny stumbles upon information about the man executed for killing her father, it leads to a series of dark and painful revelations.

Truth, justice, mercy—none of these are as simple as Ginny once believed. And the most shocking crimes may not be the ones committed out of anger or greed, but the sacrifices we make for love.

Review:

Set during the 1950s,The Last Suppers by Mandy Mikulencak is an absolutely riveting novel about a young woman who is a cook at a Louisiana prison.

Ginny Polk works in the kitchen of the same prison her murdered father once worked as a guard. She is also romantically involved with her father’s best friend, Roscoe Simmons, who is now the prison warden. Very much ahead of her time, Ginny is uninterested in marrying her much older lover since it would mean giving up her job in the prison kitchen.  In another divergence from a typical white woman in the deep South, she considers her much older African American co-worker, Dot, to be her best friend and surrogate mother. While Ginny loves her job, her vocation lies in the meals she prepares for prisoners who are about to be put to death for their crimes. Although she never loses sight the horrific crimes these men have been convicted of committing, Ginny also feels they deserve one last act of compassion before they go to the electric chair.

Ginny is quite contemplative as she tries to understand what motivates her to take such care with the death row inmates’ last meal. She is well aware that her traumatic childhood experiences  are a factor in her devotion to ensuring their prisoners last supper has meaning. This curiosity is the catalyst that begins her quest to find answers to questions that have long troubled her, but it is a shocking discovery about her beloved father that jeopardizes everything she holds dear.

As she reminisces about her larger than life, garrulous father, Ginny slowly starts to understand that he had also had a dark side.  Roscoe has tried to protect her from the truth about the man she idolizes but she has no choice but face the fact that her father also had a cruel streak. After she stumbles onto proof that shatters her illusions about him, Ginny sets out to right a horrific wrong, but she inadvertently uncovers the stunning truth about what happened the night of her father’s murder.

The Last Suppers is starkly compelling novel that accurately depicts many of the issues of the time period including race relations and the deplorable conditions at the prison. Ginny is an empathetic young woman who is sometimes a little naive and impulsive, but her heart is always in the right place. With a multi-layered, richly developed and meticulously researched storyline, Mandy Mikulencak’s debut is poignant, through-provoking and ultimately, redemptive.

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Filed under A John Scognamiglio Book, Contemporary, Historical, Historical (50s), Literary Fiction, Mandy Mikulencak, Rated B+, Review, The Last Suppers