It’s always interesting to notice the unintentional connections between books when I reflect on them afterward. This past month I read three authors whose work I’ve previously loved—Simon Stranger, S. A. Cosby, and Sadeqa Johnson—and two of them I’ve even heard speak at the LA Times Festival of Books. Also unintentionally, I read two pairs of very similar types of books—two crime fiction novels and two World War II-related books—but they couldn’t have been more different, which made for a very engaging reading month.

El Corte Inglés, Madrid, February 21, 2026

Adding to the positive reading experience this past month was the fact that my husband and I traveled to Spain, and in anticipation of this trip, I was eager to add another title or two to my list of Spanish literature. Last month I read the second installment of The White City Trilogy, which I had begun a few years ago. While I enjoyed it and it deepened my appreciation for Spanish history and culture (Reading Lately, January 2026), it wasn’t the perfect choice for this trip since it was set in a region we wouldn’t be visiting. In my continued search, I stumbled across Red Queen, the first book in the Antonia Scott series by Juan Gómez-Jurado. It turned out to be an ideal pick. Not only did the story have a strong sense of place in Madrid, which I greatly appreciated, but also the author had just released a new book, Mentira, which was prominently displayed all over Madrid. It was fun to realize I was reading a popular contemporary Spanish author!

Have you read any of the books or authors that I read in February?

King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby (2025) 📖
Narrated by Adam Lazarre-White 🎧

This is the third book by this author that I’ve read, and once again, I was completely drawn into the suspenseful story with its outstanding writing. It’s a very gritty Southern crime novel about a man who returns to his small Virginia hometown after years away when his father is in a coma after a hit-and-run accident. As he reconnects with his siblings and the community he left behind, he is pulled into a dangerous conflict involving local gangs and long-buried family tensions. It’s tense and violent with flawed characters. I’m not sure how I felt about the ending, but I was fully enthralled until the bitter end. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

• Read Around the World: North America (Virginia)

Red Queen (Antonia Scott #1) by Juan Gómez-Jurado (2018)
Translated from the Spanish by Nicholas Caistor (2023) 📖

This is the first in a series that introduces the secret investigative organization, Red Queen, and Antonia Scott, a brilliant but reclusive investigator with an extraordinary ability to solve the most complex crimes. When a powerful family’s son is murdered and another wealthy victim is kidnapped, a disgraced police officer and Antonia team up to help solve the case. As they race against time, they confront a cunning mastermind behind a chilling and carefully orchestrated plot. It has a strong sense of place in Madrid, which I especially appreciated given my recent visit there, and I enjoyed the relationship between Antonia and the police officer. ⭐️⭐️⭐

• Read Around the World: Western Europe (Spain)

Keeper of Lost Children by Sadeqa Johnson (2026)
Narrated by Ariel Blake, Karen Chilton, Adam Lazarre-White 🎧

One of my favorite types of novels is one that brings to life an unknown historical person or event, and that is exactly what this novel did beyond expectations. Based on Mabel Grammer’s Brown Baby Plan, this novel explores the little-known fate of the mixed-race children born to Black American soldiers and German women after World War II. The storyline alternates between a young soldier stationed in Germany in 1948, a Black Army officer’s wife who becomes determined to help abandoned mixed-race children, and a Black teenager in 1965 Maryland who begins to question her identity. I equally enjoyed all three perspectives with their struggles and triumphs, and the audiobook with three different narrators was phenomenal.
⭐️⭐️⭐⭐️⭐

• Read Around the World: USA & Germany

Museum for mordere og redningsmenn (The Museum of Murderers and Rescuers) by Simon Stranger (2023) 📖

This is the second book by this Norwegian author that I’ve read, and I was equally, if not even more, engrossed in this book than the first (Reading Lately, February 2023). Both of them are documentary novels with very unique structures that tackle the history of Jews in Norway during World War II and the connection to his own family. While the first one was structured like a dictionary, this one was designed like a museum where each chapter was a room filled with objects and photographs whose stories moved the novel forward. The first has been translated to English (Keep Saying Their Names translated by Matt Bagguley), but the second one is not yet available in English.

This second book tells the story of a Jewish couple from Oslo who were killed by the border guides whom they thought would lead them to safety in Sweden. At the same time, the reader learns about the author’s wife’s grandmother whose family did safely make it to Sweden but whose home and belongings were taken from them by the Nazis in Norway. Additionally, during the author’s research and writing process, he discovered unknown information about his own family’s involvement during this period as well. It was a dark and difficult period during Norway’s past. I am in awe of how the author was able to tell these painful stories in such an engaging and engrossing way.  ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

• Read Around the World: Nordic Countries (Norway)
• Nordic Literature Reading Challenge: Norway (Prize List, Booksellers’ Prize Nominee 2023)

What have you been reading lately?

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