Murder on the Orient Express is arguably Agatha Christie's most famous Poirot story, and for good reason.

Our Belgian detective is aboard the fabled Orient Express when a snowstorm stops the train on its tracks. When morning comes, it is discovered that a passenger has been stabbed to death in his locked compartment. With the snow outside, it becomes clear that the murderer must still be on the train, and it is up to Poirot to figure out who it is.

This is my favorite type of murder mystery—a locked room. The suspects have nowhere to go and the guilty party must be one of them. What follows is a brilliantly twisty whodunnit with red herrings and interesting characters who all have something to hide. And when the solution is revealed, I'm blown away by the cleverness and how the clues were there all along.

The only quibble I have is that Poirot goes and interviews each person one by one, which is then recorded in detail. This format is pretty common in quite a few Poirot books, but it isn't my preferred style. It can get boring and repetitive to hear each person describe the same event with just a slightly different spin. But that's usually over soon enough, and then we can get back to the exciting parts.

I first started reading Agatha Christie in 8th grade, partly to learn English and partly because my younger self found murders fascinating. Thus began my love affair with Agatha Christie and she remains one of my favorite authors of all time. Often books we enjoy in our childhood do not hold up to rereadings as an adult, but this one sure does.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

Before the Fall centers around the crash of a private plane, and how a painter and a little boy survive while all the others perish. There's no denying that the mystery behind a plane crash is compelling, and the story definitely benefits from that. In the end, the mystery is satisfactorily solved, and we find out what transpires to crash the plane.

That said, this book is held back by a few things. The pacing is terribly uneven. At times, it feels like it's being written by two different authors, one who is focused on advancing the story, keeping everything tightly and expertly paced; while the other is prone to random philosophical ramblings and completely unrelated side stories of each passenger's past. I very much enjoyed the former author's writing, and wish there was less of the latter's in the book.

As a reader, I have a problem with random ramblings equating to deepness, as if some nonsensical sentences that sound good put together with crudeness is necessary to propel a story from average to great, from artificial to genuine. And I feel this story suffered from this. Most of the characters in this book are either strangely foul-mouthed narcissists or incoherent long-winded ramblers (or both!) who come across as exaggerated caricatures. And it took away from what should have been a fast-paced book and slowed the forward momentum at crucial points.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

The Good Widow is another one of those books that begins with so much promise. Jacks finds out that her husband died on a trip to Maui with his mistress, and she, along with the mistress's fiancee Nick, goes there to find answers and closure. It sounds interesting enough, especially because this book is marketed as a thriller, with a mystery that they are solving together.

But no, the book was pretty much 95% drama, and a bad one at that. None of the characters are likable, including the dead people. Jacks' husband had all sorts of issues, from anger management to arrogance to emotional immaturity. His mistress sounds delusional about their future prospects and was terribly clingy. And it's hard to have sympathy for Jacks and Nick for loving these people and inexplicably traveling to their death location just to have a look-see.

The "mystery" does finally come together at the end, but it's pretty far-fetched, and the way everything is wrapped up is outlandish and depressing.

I'm giving this book an extra star because it does have a few well-written and emotionally-wrenching passages about love and death. Otherwise, I would have given this book just one star.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

I'm a data person. I pride myself on being logical and looking at the numbers before making decisions. And for quite a few years, I worked at a data visualization company and was a self-professed data geek. But can more data actually lead to worse results? That is what Weapons of Math Destruction tries to understand.

Insightful and timely, this book provides a detailed look at how algorithms based on big data don't always tell the truth or lead to a more fair world as they are purported to do. Rather, they contribute to a system that is opaque and hard to challenge, increasing the divide between the privileged and everyone else.

Each chapter provides a thoughtful exploration of an area where big data is supposed to be helping, such as college rankings, recidivism of convicts, applying for jobs, and getting loans. Algorithms in each area help define which are the best colleges, which convicts are most likely to reoffend, what personality types are best suited for a job, and who should get the best interest rates. That sounds useful, right?

But unfortunately, ideal data is not always available, so bad or irrelevant data is often used instead. And the resulting predictions are treated as gospel, increasing efficiency of the system, but harming those caught on the wrong side. It hurts a segment of the population while providing the rest of us with the false belief that fairness and justice has being done. In many cases, the algorithms' predictions create a negative feedback loop, directly influencing the outcome they were objectively trying to determine.

I found this book to be interesting and relevant. It really goes to show that your predictions are only as good as the data you've got. Whether you're a data geek like me or you just want to learn a little more about big data's potentially harmful effects, this is a worthwhile book to check out.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

Little Fires Everywhere is an intriguing look at what happens when unexpected views and happenings are thrown into a well-regulated and well-planned upper-middle class community. The story centers around a mother and daughter who arrive from out of town and rents from the Richardson family.

Even though the teaser for the book makes it seem like there is some mystery surrounding the mother and daughter, I would say the mystery plays only a small part of importance in the book. Rather, it is more a slow and steady character study of all the personalities in this drama. And Ng does a great job drawing the readers in, taking them on this journey with plenty of astute observations about life and relationships.

However, for all the positives and how much I enjoyed this book, I also thought it was just unrealistic. Whenever an issue is brought up in this story, however nuanced, every character immediately picks a side and stubbornly sticks to it, while jumping to vilify the other side. People did not reach out to understand the other viewpoint, and there is no attempt at a dialogue to even try. The fact that everyone in this story is like this makes it feel contrived and hard to believe. And with so many one-dimensional characters, the book ultimately ends up feeling like a caricature of the story it's trying to tell.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

Local Girl Missing starts out with so much promise. Frankie's best friend, Sophie, died 20 years ago, and her body was never recovered. When Frankie receives a call from Sophie's brother saying that Sophie's remains have been found and begging her to return to her old hometown to help him identify her and track down her killer, she agrees and goes. That sounds pretty interesting, right? Unfortunately, the story pretty much devolves into a giant mess from then on.

A large part of the problem is that everyone acts silly in the story. The narrative alternates between present-day Frankie's and 20 years ago Sophie's point of view. Once Frankie gets to her hometown, she immediately starts receiving threatening notes and feels like she's being watched. She constantly tells herself she should leave, but then she just stays. This cycle repeats for days. Even though she is 40 years old, she thinks and acts like an immature baby, constantly angling for attention. In the story, supposedly everyone likes her, but I find that seriously hard to believe.

Sophie doesn't do any better, keeping secrets left and right, even when it's not necessary. The whole mystery wouldn't have happened if she hadn't kept everything from everyone close to her, guarding her secrets like they are great treasures.

About half way through the book, you can kind of see where it's going. From then on, the story crawls along, like a soap opera trying to draw out each moment without anything new happening. The mystery doesn't really progress. The suspense is the fake kind, where nothing is happening. We the readers find out more, not because some new clue is discovered or deduced, but because the narrators finally decide it's time to drop us little nuggets of info.

And when we finally reach the merciful end, the twist is just laughable.

Readaroo Rating: 1 star

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry is a heartwarming and magical story that blurs the line between real life and fairy tales, told from the eyes of a seven-year-old girl. Elsa's grandmother has always regaled her with fairy tales from the Land-of-Almost-Awake, and when her grandmother dies, she leaves behind a treasure hunt for Elsa. As Elsa proceeds on her adventure, she starts to realize that her grandmother's fairy tales and their real lives are much closer than anyone would have guessed.

There are so many amazing things about this book. The world that is the Land-of-Almost-Awake is complex and well-thought-out. The blending of that make-believe world with the real world is seamless and masterful. We meet lots of interesting characters who evolve as the story progresses. And the story is touching and uplifting without being cheesy.

As with other books I've read by Backman (A Man Called Ove and Britt-Marie Was Here), it takes a while for the story to pick up, so the first few chapters seem a bit slow. And there's a lot of information to take in about all the fairy tales. But don't let that discourage you. All the relevant info you need will be repeated later. If you press on, you will be richly rewarded.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

The Gatekeepers is a well-researched look at the White House chiefs of staff under Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr., Clinton, Bush Jr., and Obama; and their styles, abilities, accomplishments and failures in that role. The book explores the relationship between a chief's effectiveness and his president's ability to get things done during that time.

It talks about how the role has evolved into its modern reincarnation, what each president wants from their chiefs, and the consequences of that seminal choice. It's full of interesting details and tidbits, offering a backstage look at the defining moments in each president's tenure from the chief of staff's perspective.

I've long-held a fascination with the role ever since John Spencer played chief of staff Leo McGarry on The West Wing, and it's heartening to read that just like on the show, most chiefs are there working tirelessly to do the best they can for the country and for their president.

One note here: there is a quote in the book that completely gives away the ending of Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. I was in shock when I read it, just in the middle of the book without any spoiler warnings. It's not ok to give away another book's ending, and I'm very disappointed it was included in the book. So be warned.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

Homegoing is a stunning saga spanning eight generations, starting with two half-sisters in Ghana, one who lives a life of relative ease in Cape Coast Castle, while the other is imprisoned in the same castle and sold off as a slave. The book is structured so that each chapter is in essence a short story focused on one person, alternating between the two sisters and their descendants through the generations.

Even though each chapter is about a different character, Gyasi deftly weaves together a complete and cohesive story, building each generation on the generations before. At the hands of a less capable author, the story could start to lose momentum as we switch from one character to another, but not here. I finished this book in just three days, unable to put it down or think about anything else.

At its heart, this book is trying to show the impact of slavery and colonialism on everyone. And that impact is felt for many generations, robbing families of spouses, parents, siblings, children, their dignity and often a fair shot at a good future. The stories in here are heartbreaking, made even more emotionally griping because they are a distillation of the true experiences of so many.

I've read a lot of books this year, and most will pass into and out of my memory with barely a backwards glance. But this book, with its rich and haunting narratives, I know will be seared into my memory as one of my favorite books this year.

Readaroo Rating: 5 stars!