Paradise is a Library

2008 in review

2009-01-04T05:46:00.000-08:00

Only 33 books read in 2008. I’ve been keeping track of what I read since 1997, and this is but a fraction of some past years. On the other hand, in the past, I read a lot of … how shall we put it … less than memorable mysteries. These days, I’m busier with work, I have other hobbies and interests, and I often have lunch with friends instead of holing up by myself and reading. Those seem to be good things. (OK, OK, I admit that many days I don’t read while I eat lunch because I’m catching up on email, but still….)

I always used to have to spend a good bit of time going through my list of books trying to come up with the top ten. When there are 200 titles, it’s a little different. I think I’ve had years where my first cut for a top ten was around 30 titles!

Given that I spend less time reading now, I do tend to spend my time with things I enjoy. All of these were well worth my time, and picking a top ten from only 33 seems a bit ridiculous, so I won’t do that this year.

I never set formal reading goals in the past, as I was uncomfortable with making recreation seem like work, but I do have one this year: make sure I read at least one book per month. April 2008 was barren, as you’ll see below, but the March and May reads were on the borders, so the drought was fairly lengthy. That didn’t feel good.

Right now, I’m reading the fourth Stephenie Meyer, to wrap up the Bella-Edward-Jacob saga and have started Pierre Bayard’s Who Killed Roger Ackroyd? I also have the latest Margaret Maron and Laura Lippman from the library.

Happy new year to everyone.

The 2008 List

January

Kate Ellis, The Skeleton Room

Charlaine Harris, Ice Cold Grave

John Hart, The King of Lies

Carol Goodman, The Sonnet Lover

Joanne Trollope, Friday Nights

John Hart, Down River

February

Steve Hamilton, Night Work

Anita Shreve, Resistance

March

Greg Iles, Third Degree

Louise Perry, The Cruelest Month

April

May

Heather Terrell, The Map Thief

June

Carol Goodman, The Night Villa

July

Peter Robinson, Friend of the Devil

Craig Johnson, Another Man’s Moccasins

Harlan Coben, Hold Tight

Ian Rankin, The Naming of the Dead

August

Deborah Crombie, Where Memories Lie

September

David Handler, Sour Cherry Surprise

Hallie Ephron, Never Tell a Lie

October

Robert Crais, Chasing Darkness

Edward Bloor, Taken

November

Ladies’ Night at Finbar’s Hotel (short stories)

Lee Child, Nothing to Lose

Robert B Parker, Rough Water

Edward Bloor, London Calling

Maeve Binchy, Heart and Soul (reviewed for Library Journal, due out in March)

Pierre Bayard, How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read (non-fiction)

Colin Meloy, Let It Be (memoir of sorts, part of Continuum’s 33 1/3 series, about the Replacements’ album, not the Beatles)

December

Stephenie Meyer, Twilight

Stephenie Meyer, New Moon

Jodi Picoult, My Sister’s Keeper

Agatha Christie, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Stephenie Meyer, Eclipse

Breaking the Reading Drought

2008-07-25T23:47:00.001-07:00

Back in the pre-blog days, I used to read a couple of hundred books a year. Really. Mostly mysteries, and not always good, lengthy, complicated ones, lots of subpar series in there, don’t get me wrong, but I was really voracious. I got back into mysteries with a vengeance when I finished my master’s degree in comparative literature and was able to view reading as a pleasurable activity, not as work, when I was able to choose my reading materials once again. Over the years, I’ve slowed down, but still have been coming close to the 100 mark.

In recent years, I’ve become involved in other hobbies, such as knitting. Since moving to Washington State, I’ve also been busier at work, putting in more hours outside the typical day, along with being more social at work, often eating lunch with colleagues instead of holing up with a book.

This spring, though, I really hit a dry spell. Between March and mid July, I didn’t finish a book, except for a couple of books I reviewed for Library Journal, and even those didn’t get my full attention until I was pushing against deadline.

Part of the reason was that we got addicted to a bunch of TV shows and were watching them on DVD as fast as Netflix could deliver them. Another reason was that I got addicted to Packrat, a game hosted in Facebook. But it dawned on me recently that another factor contributing to my reading slowdown may be my changed relationship with food.

Reading mysteries was often linked to eating for me, not just reading while I ate meals alone. I can recall sitting down with a bag of Red Vines and a new Janet Evanovich on a summer afternoon, finishing both within a couple hours. And all sorts of chips and crackers went well with books, as did various candies. I think I must have been eating as compulsively as I read, ripping through food as I ripped through series of mysteries of all sub-genres.

In September 2007 I joined Weight Watchers and have lost 72 pounds so far. My eating habits have changed drastically, obviously.

Recently during my “staycation” I was able to relax and read, polishing off the latest Craig Johnson, last year’s Ian Rankin (oh god how can there only be one more Rebus novel but I digress), and the latest Harlan Coben over the course of a few days. However, it dawned on me that I was also polishing off a lot of food. Healthier snacks, to be sure, such as apples and carrots, but I was also consuming a higher volume of WW snack bars and the 100 calorie bags of Doritos, which are on program but are still a bunch of empty carbs.

This is definitely something I will be working on in the future, because I really enjoyed reading again, but I have to figure out how to break the connection between the two activities.

January booklist

2008-02-03T08:30:00.000-08:00

Kate Ellis, The Skeleton Room
#7 Wesley Peterson

One of my favorite series. The plot always mixes a present day case with a historical one. Our police detective Wesley has a degree in archaelogy.

Charlaine Harris, Ice Cold Grave
latest Harper Connelly

I don't really like supernatural themes that much, but I like Harris so much I just can't help but love this series. Harper has the ability to find dead people and see what killed them as a result of being struck by lightning. In this outing, Harper is drawn into a serial killer case -- and finally works out her relationship with her step-brother.

John King, The King of Lies

I loved this book. Main character is a lawyer with a messed up family history who has to solve the murder of his father.

Carol Goodman, The Sonnet Lover

One of my favorite authors. In this one, an English professor gets pulled into a situation involving murder and stolen poetry. The poems in question may provide the answer to long-lived literary mysteries: who was Shakespeare's Dark Lady? and did he ever go to Italy?

Joanna Trollope, Friday Nights

This is her new one - got it to review for Library Journal. I like her books a lot, and this one was very good too. It's about a group of women who become friends and go through some challenges, but they don't get together for a book club or knitting group, and no one is terminally ill, so it was quite refreshing!

John Hart, Down River

I was initially disappointed to realize this one wasn't a continuation with the characters from King of Lies but I got over that pretty quick. In this novel, a man who was acquitted of murder charges returns to his hometown after 5 years when a friend calls him for help. King is a master of writing about dysfunctional families. The mystery elements are pretty good, too :-)

Catching up - November and December reads

2008-01-05T10:24:00.000-08:00

Just for the record, here are the November and December 2007 lists.

November

Jodi Picoult, Vanishing Acts - another excellent one from Picoult; dealt with a woman who does search and rescue and learns that her own life is not what she thought it was. Very compelling characters and a complex plot.

Kate Ellis, The Painted Doom - another strong entry in the Wesley Peterson series; really enjoy the historical aspects that blend in with a present-day case

Robert B. Parker, Now and Then - one of the better recent Spensers

December

Stuart Woods, Shoot Him If He Runs - Stone Barrington and his superb vodka gimlet recipe return to action

Benjamin Black, Christine Falls - Black is the penname used by Irish novelist John Banville, for this, the first in a projected mystery series. Set in 1950's Dublin, interesting characters, and a plot that jumped across the pond to Boston, I really enjoyed this and look forward to more. Definitely not a formulaic mystery; very well written.

Sue Grafton, T is for Trespass - latest in the Kinsey Millhone series; an excellent entry in one of my all-time favorite series

Kate Wilhelm, A Wrongful Death - latest in the Barbara Holloway series - well done story of a woman caught up in industrial espionage and a custody battle who turns to Barbara and the crew for help.

Dean Koontz, The Darkest Evening of the Year - I don't typically like supernatural type novels, but Koontz does it so well. His recent works have been very deep, with good characters and plotting, and this one continues that trend. Do I believe that the spirit of a little girl could come back and embody a dog in order to help her mother in many ways? It doesn't matter, really. The book is excellent.

Valerie Martin, Trespass - an intriguing tale of two families that connect through the romance of the respective son and daughter; very richly drawn characters and a plot that weaves together the brutality of the Bosnian conflict and present day America.

The Year in Review

2007-12-30T21:15:00.000-08:00

A year in review posting is perhaps a bit premature, because, after all, I could read a great book tomorrow, and because I haven't posted my November or December reading lists. Nevertheless, here's the scoop for 2007.

This was my lowest reading year since 1997, with a total of 83 books read. For the first time ever, I had a top 10 mystery list with only one pass through my reading journal. No whittling down a list of 25, no honorable mention category needed. However, I did read more fiction and non-fiction this past year. I think the biggest impact on my reading, though, was being hooked on watching TV series on DVD.

Top 10 Mysteries of 2007 (in alphabetical order)

Giles Blunt, By the Time You Read This

Lee Child, Bad Luck and Trouble

Michael Connelly, The Overlook

Deborah Crombie, Water Like a Stone

Sue Grafton, T is for Trespass

Margaret Maron, Hard Row

Marcia Muller, The Ever Running Man

Nancy Pickard, The Virgin of Small Plains

S. J. Rozan, In This Rain

Karin Slaughter, Beyond Reach

Best Fiction:

Sarah Addison Allen, Garden Spells

Elisabeth Hyde, The Abortionist's Daughter

Valerie Martin, Trespass

Find of the Year (or, the I-Can't-Believe-I-Never-Read

-This-Author-Before Award):

Jodi Picoult

Best New or New-to-Me Mystery Series:

Benjamin Black

Craig Johnson

Louise Penny

October reads

2007-11-04T07:00:00.000-08:00

Jodi Picoult, Picture Perfect
Continuing the Picoult trend, this one drug a bit for me. But it was still good.

PJ Parrish, A Thousand Bones
Latest in their Louis Kincaid series. They turn their focus to Joe this time, outlining her first big case as a rookie cop. Very well done.

Robert Parker, High Profile
Recent in the Jesse Stone series, enjoyable enough, although the cross-pollination with the other series is a mite tedious.

Wendy Walker, Four Wives
This was an ARC sent to me for a Library Journal review – a very well done novel about four friends and their lives. Wilda sends me such great stuff to review, I'm a lucky girl.

Sarah Addison Allen, Garden Spells
Loved this book! A great story of sisters, dealing with your past and finding a new path.

Robert Parker, Spare Change
The recent Sunny Randall -- she helps out on a case that appears to be the re-emergence of a serial killer, called the Spare Change Killer. Her dad had been unable to solve this case back when he was on the police force. It was nice to get to know Sunny's dad a bit better.

Stuart Woods, Fresh Disasters
Catching up on the Stone Barrington series with this one. It's a typical Stone adventure. You would think his reputation would get around and he would never get a new girlfriend (given the chances that you'll die a violent death before page 150).

Thomas Perry, Nightlife
Excellent suspense - a police detective is on the hunt for a serial killer.

Jo Bannister, Flawed
Latest in the Brodie Farrell series, just OK imo, a lot of time spent re-trodding the love sorta-triangle stuff.

September reads

2007-11-04T06:54:00.000-08:00

Craig Johnson, Death Without Company
#2 in the series about the sheriff in Wyoming. Very well done in terms of plot, characters, humor. A great series.

Craig Johnson, Kindness Goes Unpunished
#3 in the series, another great one

Marcia Muller, The Ever Running Man
Latest in the Sharon McCone series, one of my long-time favorites. In this one, Sharon has to investigate Hy and his partners in order to find out who is trying to destroy them and their firm.

Susan Isaacs, Past Perfect
Funny novel with a light mystery element. Isaacs makes me laugh out loud at least a few times per book. In this one, a woman who was fired from her low-level job at the CIA and still doesn't know why has the chance to find out what was going on. As she digs into the past, things get tricky and turn into a spy thriller (with that hint of farce).

Jodi Picoult, Plain Truth
Jodi Picoult, Second Glance
Jodi Picoult, The Pact
Jodi Picoult, The Tenth Circle

Had never gotten around to reading any of her work and for some reason finally tried one. Plain Truth was an excellent legal thriller, and I just gobbled up a bunch of hers. I loved all four of these, although Second Glance and The Tenth Circle were my favorites. I really admire the complexity of her plotting.

August reads

2007-09-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

August was a bit slow for me in terms of reading, but an excellent assortment. (Well, except for the two DNF's discussed in the previous post. :-)

Ann Hood, The Knitting Circle
A group of women are drawn together through a knitting group at their yarn store. They are all suffering in their own ways and are able to overcome their personal barriers and become friends. Well-written, not too sentimental or cliched.

Karin Slaughter, Beyond Reach
The latest in the Sara Linton - Grant Co. series. It's a good one, but the ending is heartbreaking.

Peter Lovesey, The Secret Hangman
Latest in the Peter Diamond series. Diamond and the team investigate a series of murders made to look like suicides.

Harlan Coben, The Woods
Latest standalone thriller from him. Paul Copeland, a widowed attorney with a young daughter, is faced with evidence that his sister may not have been killed 20 yrs ago as had always been assumed. The end has an improbable twist, like all of his do, but this one was not throw-book-against-wall silly, imo.

Margaret Maron, Hard Row
Latest in the Deborah Knott series, one of my all time favorite series. Some gruesome discoveries pull Deborah and Dwight into an unusual case.

Anita Shreve, Body Surfing
A young widow who works as a tutor for the lovely daughter of a family falls in love with one of the sons. Nothing is ever really as it seems. I had a strange reaction to this one -- didn't really like it but couldn't quit reading.

An encounter with an annoying noun

2007-08-31T14:55:00.000-07:00

I had picked up a couple of "regular" fiction books at the public library, and thought I would read one of them in between some mysteries.

The first one I picked up off the pile was Susan Kelly’s The Last of Something. It’s a fairly typical plot: four old friends, now married, with various levels of successes and problems in their lives, are getting together for their annual reunion. It’s the first time in several years all of them can attend. Early on, as we’re getting to know the players, the narrator notes that “I’ve a prescience of loss” (3). I wasn’t sure which bugged me more: the use of “I’ve” or the use of “prescience.” I wasn’t being grabbed by the narrator anyway, so I put it in my return to library tote bag.

I then grabbed Hilma Wolitzer’s Summer Reading. It’s the other typical plot of women’s fiction: a group of women from different backgrounds are brought together, in this case for a book club. Someone on one of my mysteryfiction online groups had tried to read it but dismissed it as too “highbrow” (the book club’s first read is Madame Bovary). I got toward the end of the first chapter, wasn’t sure I cared for the narrator, but was willing to go on, when I became quite annoyed upon reading the last sentence, in which the narrator notes feeling “a shivery thrill of prescience” (10).

Close book gently. Look for the back to the library tote bag. Insert bag into tote. Go grab another book off the shelf.

Although I had more than a prescient feeling that these two books weren’t for me, I feel so incredibly grateful that I was able to find them at public libraries. I’ve been a fan of libraries since I was quite young, and I don’t know how I would be able to survive financially without being able to score most of my reading material from libraries. I feel really sorry for people who don’t have good access to libraries (or access to good libraries).

July booklist

2007-08-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

Louise Perry, A Fatal Grace
#2 in the series set in Montreal, liked the first one a bit better, but very well done.

Maggie Sefton, A Killer Stitch
Latest in the Kelly Flynn series; she solves another mystery connected to the yarn store clientele. Great cliffhanger for the next one, too.

Kate Wilhelm, Sleight of Hand
Most recent Barbara Holloway, another excellent one in this series. Barbara defends an old friend of her father's who is accused of theft, then murder.

Maeve Binchy, Whitethorn Woods
I love Maeve Binchy. This was a really good one, with lots of characters and stories set in a town with a shrine that people visit, hoping for miracles. The multitude of voices made me think of some of her older books that I love, like Evening Class.

Edna Buchanan, Love Kills
Britt Montero and the Cold Case Squad are both featured in this one.

Rob Sheffield, Love is a Mix Tape
See post below. Excellent book.

J.A. Konrath, Rusty Nail
#3 in the Jacqueline Daniels series. I like the humor, but man, he writes the creepiest villains. This one was really over the top, and I had to skim a lot in the last one!

Connie Willis, Bellwether
Willis is mostly known as a sci fi writer, but this one wasn't. A funny story of a woman who researches trends and fads, deals with crazy co-workers, and finds true love. Each chapter begins with a fun little blurb about a real fad.

John Sandford, Invisible Prey
Latest Lucas Davenport, always enjoyable

Earlene Fowler, Tumbling Blocks
Latest Benni Harper, light on the mystery, heavy on the family issues in this one

Nell Freudenberg, Lucky Girls
An excellent collection of short stories, all featuring women dealing with troubled relationships, including mothers-daughters, fathers-daughters, lovers, spouses. Very well written, and all have a connection to India and Southeast Asia, mostly in portraying Americans living there.

Craig Johnson, The Cold Dish
First in a new series about a widowed sheriff in Wyoming, was a very enjoyable read. His sense of humor is great, and I loved the characters. I thought the ending was a bit contrived, but overall this was a very good read.

Love is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time, Rob Sheffield

2007-07-14T09:08:00.000-07:00

Rolling Stone writer Rob Sheffield has written a brilliantly funny yet heart-wrenching memoir of what music meant to him as a young person, how it brought him together with his wife, how it flavored their life, and how he coped with her sudden death.

His exposition on the culture and types of mix tapes is quite hilarious, ranging from the Party Tape (“par-tay!”), to the I Want You tape, to the We’re Doing It? Awesome! tape. He also describes the You Like Music, I Like Music, I Can Tell We’re Going to Be Friends tape, which when mistaken for an I Want You tape results in “hilarity and hijinks all around” (14).

The segment about his duties as music coordinator for the eighth grade dance is also priceless. When his mom tells him that “We Will Rock You” is catchy, he deletes it from the playlist. At the big event, he learns that girls will not leave their seats to dance to Boston, “despite the cathedral-like grandeur of Tom Scholz’ guitar solo in the second movement of `Don’t Look Back’” (35). Disco songs save the night. Sheffield then segues into a discussion of the concept of “bitch power,” as “elucidated by the great twentieth-century philosopher Rick James” (35).

I laughed out loud more times than I could count during the first 138 pages. The book then takes the sad turn. You know what’s coming, because he tells you right from the start what this is all about, but you just keep reading along hoping that we’re not really going there.

But we do. And it’s sad, but Sheffield tells it true and breaks your heart in the way that you don’t mind, because it was all so good and it will be good once again, even though she is gone. (This book should be required reading for anyone who is grieving the loss of a spouse, but particularly for those under the age of 40 who may be feeling as isolated as Sheffield did.)

For those of us whose identities, emotions and lives are wrapped up in the music and the memory of the music and the anticipation of the music to come, this book will get under your skin and into your blood just like the tunes.

June reading

2007-07-01T08:13:00.000-07:00

Carol O'Connell, Find Me
My favorite sociopath Kathleen Mallory takes a road trip, searching for clues about her father and helping to solve a serial killer case.

Maryann Burk Carver, What It Used to Be Like
Memoir/biography/autobiography from Raymond Carver's first wife. Fascinating stuff about one of my all time favorite American writers. And she gets an extra gold star for the Carveresque title.

Nancy Pickard, The Virgin of Small Plains
A man returns to his hometown to set the record straight about what really happened years ago on the night a young girl was found murdered.

T Jefferson Parker, Storm Runners
This one started off strong and then got too silly. Too many bizarre subplots competing for attention. I also just didn't like the female lead character. I have really enjoyed most of his books but this one was a weak one.

Kate Jacobs, Friday Night Knitting Club
A very well done (which for me means not too melodramatic) "chick lit" type novel about a single mom who owns a knitting store and the women who work there and shop there. Lots of good characters. Kind of reminded me of the Jennifer Chiaverini quilt novels, but with a less "cozy" feel.

Ann Cleves, Raven Black
Excellent debut in what I hope will be a long seriees; features a DI named Jimmy Perez working in Scotland.

CJ Box, Free Fire
I really love this series. In this one, game warden Joe Pickett gets his job back, sort of, and heads to Yellowstone to investigate a crime. I really enjoyed the descriptions of life in the park and all the various subcultures.

Lee Child, Bad Luck and Trouble
Jack Reacher rides again. The plot got a little stretched for me at the end, but you just gotta love these. The stuff with the clothes just cracks me up. Like when he buys two (count them, two!) t-shirts but then puts them both on and throws his other shirt in the trash. Or when they gear up for the final stand, everyone else gets two sets of the jacket/pants combo, but Reacher only gets one. Of course, now that he actually has a bank account and an ATM card, it's anyone's guess what chains of domesticity Child will weigh him down with next. :-)

May reads

2007-06-01T09:36:00.000-07:00

Started off the month continuing with the Tolkien binge:

Tolkien – The Two Towers

Tolkien – The Return of the King

Then returned to a series I'd lost track of, written by Kate Ellis, featuring a Caribbean-British, college-educated police sergeant who gets to put his knowledge of archeology to good use. The plots always have a present day crime that somehow links to a historical ones. Very well written and an enjoyable series. The two I read were The Funeral Boat and The Bone Garden.

Next up was Susan Wittig Albert – Spanish Dagger - disappointing recent entry in the China Bayles series. The plot was thin, the dialogue was forced, just not one of her best.

Then was blown away by Giles Blunt – By the Time You Read This - the latest in the John Cardinal series. Chilling. Excellent suspense. I love this series.

Catching up - April reads

2007-06-01T09:34:00.000-07:00

Most of these were so good, I had to talk about them individually (see previous posts).

SJ Rozan – In This Rain

Elisabeth Hyde – The Abortionist’s Daughter

Lisa Scottoline – The Devil’s Corner

Jane Smiley –The Age of Grief

Laurie Lico Albanese – Blue Suburbia

Tolkien – Fellowship of the Ring

Blue Suburbia, Laurie Lico Albanese (New York: HarperCollins, 2004)

2007-04-19T12:20:00.000-07:00

Billed as “almost a memoir,” this is an autobiography written in free verse. She tells her story of a childhood with an abusive father, who himself was abused by his father, and a cold, distant, unhappy mother, whom I would imagine was clinically depressed. She escapes her hometown and gets herself to college, and then eventually into a good marriage and motherhood. Yet her past haunts her, and her fears of becoming like her mother and mistreating her children, combined with suffering from anxiety disorder, overwhelms her. Therapy helps, meds help, and she turns herself around yet again. As someone with anxiety disorder who finally sought help at age 37, those passages of the book speak to me in a very special way.

It is a real accomplishment of writing. Although spare, her writing is so effective that I feel that I know her better than others who have written their memoirs in prose, in long, winding prose.

Among the highlights for me are the following.

In “Minding My Own Business,” she writes about her husband being accepted into an MBA program and choosing to quit his job and go to school full-time. She is apprehensive about finances and such, noting that while her husband sees an opportunity,

“I see
the difference
between growing up
middle class
with the promise
of more to come

and growing up
in the shadow
of the jailhouse.” (95)

The jail was built in her town when she was young, and it was built near her school. An earlier poem tells of her father teaching her self-defense techniques so she would be prepared when an escaped convict attacked her, something her father felt was certain to happen. (And yes, I asked myself why she didn’t use some of these techniques on him.)

In “Working Again,” she has triumphantly become employed as a reporter for the local paper, what she calls the “manic fulfillment” of all she has been through (142). The poem closes with

“empowerment
comes from being a big fish
in a small pond

and I don’t mean
the kind that has to float on the bottom
during winter
to stay alive.” (143)

One of the last segments is titled “Ordinary” and it begins:

“Is it dull
to have an ordinary life
or is it glorious?

I think it depends on the day
and what you think is ordinary

and how true
is your love.” (193)

It’s stunning work, and one of the most affecting things I’ve read in years.

Jane Smiley, The Age of Grief

2007-04-14T17:52:00.000-07:00

A wonderful collection of five short stories and a novella. The novella, which is titled "The Age of Grief," is the work that the movie "The Secret Lives of Dentists" was based on. I didn’t think of it at the time I read the back cover and bought the book (this was in early March when we were in Portland and Powell’s was having a 30% off sale on all Smiley’s works for some reason). That movie was damned depressing, and its original material was too, no surprise, but as is so often the case, I liked the novella much, much better, again no surprise.

The stories were originally written during 1977 to 1987. In “The Pleasure of Her Company,” a woman befriends her new neighbors and becomes very involved in their daily routines. She envies their marriage and seeks to emulate their life, and is quite surprised when the couple breaks up. Later, she learns that the whole period of their friendship as a threesome took place during the worst of the couple’s troubles and that she was a buffer for them. In “Lily,” a married couple at war with one another visit an old friend for the weekend. It’s a wonderful portrait of dysfunction. A dysfunctional family also underpins “Long Distance,” which features a man visiting his brothers and their families for Christmas. He had planned to take along his Japanese girlfriend, but at the last minute she does not come to the US to be with him. “Dynamite” is the story of a woman trying to escape her past, and you’ll have to believe me that “Jeffrey, Believe Me” is an extremely weird tale, and the weakest item in the collection for me.

I have enjoyed everything I’ve ever read of Smiley’s, but especially the academic satire Moo and the suspenseful Duplicate Keys. This collection is now among my favorites of her works.

Elisabeth Hyde, The Abortionist's Daughter

2007-04-14T17:51:00.001-07:00

This novel is a suspenseful page-turner that makes you think. Told mostly through the lens of Megan, the daughter of a doctor and a lawyer, the story begins on the night her mother is found dead, and intricately weaves the backstory with the progression of the investigation. Hyde does a solid murder mystery, complete with well-developed police detective characters, but goes beyond typical genre fare with a realistic portrayal of attitudes about reproductive health, a more-than-you-want-to-know treatise on sex and drug use among minors, the long effects of infidelity, and the unexpected results of political opposites joining forces. Highly recommended.

March reads + SJ Rozan's In This Rain

2007-04-04T05:09:00.000-07:00

Carol O'Connell, Winter House
Next to latest in the Mallory series; am still on the hold list for Find Me. Am sorry to be caught up with this series. They just get better and better. This one was in some ways the saddest one yet, as the truth about what happened to the young girl and how she spent her life is shown to have been unnecessary.

Deborah Crombie, Water Like a Stone
Latest in the Kincaid/James series, another excellent one. Murder finds them during the Christmas holidays while they are visiting Kincaid's family.

Linda Fairstein, Bad Blood
Lots of plots in this one, took awhile to pull together, but lots of interesting NY history again.

Karen Harper, The Poyson Garden
First in the Elizabeth series. This one takes place before she becomes queen, as her sister Mary is ill and dying. Elizabeth uncovers a plot against her and solves the mystery. OK, but not great.

Michael Connelly, The Overlook
New Bosch - coming out soon. I reviewed this for Library Journal. It's another great one in the series.

Slow month, but four out of five were excellent. April is off to a slow but also excellent start: just finished SJ Rozan's In This Rain this morning. It gets off to a slow start, almost too much detail about the housing and construction business and bureaucracy in Manhattan, but then it takes off and does not let go. And the heroine Ann Montgomery wears "my" perfume (Hanae Mori) :-) Rozan is one of the strongest writers we have, and this one really shows her range and her exquisite knowledge and understanding of the city.

February reading

2007-03-04T10:07:00.000-08:00

Carol O'Connell, Crime School
These just keep getting better and better. Mallory is fascinating.

David Hewson, A Season for the Dead
First in the Nic Costa series, set in Rome. Went on a bit long, but entertaining.

Gillian Roberts, A Hole in Juan
Not the best in the series, or maybe I just wasn't in the mood for a cozy.

Carol O'Connell, Dead Famous
Another stellar Mallory.

Heather Terrell, The Chrysalis
Reviewed this for Library Journal, will be published in April. A very entertaining thriller about a lawyer who gets involved in a case involving art stolen by the Nazis. Along with the present day story, she also tells the story of the family who owned the painting and also the story of the 17th century painter.

Jo Bannister, Requiem for a Dealer
Latest in the Brodie Farrell series, ok, not great (some silly plot elements)

Dana Stabenow, A Deeper Sleep
Latest in the Kate Shugak series; it's always good to see Kate

January list

2007-02-05T06:48:00.000-08:00

A slow month for reading because there was too much going on at work. It's pretty sad when I'm too tired to read in the evenings and too busy to take a full lunch break and read. Oh well.....at least I did read something non-fiction for a change! Here they are:

Tony Hillerman, The Shape Shifter
This one was a bit weak in terms of plot, but I still enjoyed visting with Leaphorn and Chee.

Michael Korda, Making the List
An interesting book about the history of the bestseller lists. Korda provides lists of the top 10 books from each year (Publishers Weekly lists) and discusses each decade overall in terms of cultural history and what was happening in the publishing business. Really pretty fascinating.

Jo Fielding, Grand Avenue
This started off strong but sunk into melodrama and wrapped up with a ridiculous courtroom battle.

Greg Iles, Turning Angel
Not very pleasant subject matter (murder and sexuality and drugs and teens), but I really like the characters and am glad he wrote another book about Penn.

Earlene Fowler, The Saddlemaker's Wife
This was a nice departure from the Benni Harper series. After her husband's death, a woman discovers he had hidden secrets about his family and she visits his hometown to uncover the truth.

Cassandra Chan, A Village Affair
#2 in the Gibbons/Bethancourt series. Gibbons is a Scotland Yard detective and Bethancourt is his aristrocratic amateur sleuth friend (sort of a less quirky version of Jury and Melrose). Enjoyable British mystery.

Alice Hoffman, Local Girls

2007-01-17T18:35:00.000-08:00

This past fall, I took a walk over to the Bookie during my lunch hour. I killed a little time looking at the sale tables and decided to buy a copy of Alice Hoffman's Local Girls that was remaindered and marked down and cost me around $3. I kept it in my office for emergency times when I might forget to bring a book to read during lunch. (As if I should ever be without a book, working in a library, but well....)

Finally started it and what a crime it was remaindered. One of the blurbs on the back says it's better than her other works. No faint praise that. The chapters read as short stories, some could stand alone, and while many are in first person, some are in third, which is just incredibly interesting. Gretel, the protagonist, is trapped on Long Island, suffering through school and her parents' divorce. We meet her at age 12, and follow her through high school, and beyond, as things become more seriously problematic for her, including her mother's health, problems with her adored older brother, and a ruinous first love.

Gretel's voice is so real - part of the reason that the shift to third person is so jarring -- and the sense of humor is biting, while mixed in with some really terrible things she goes through. Gretel is bold, doing things many of us would never dare to do. I laughed out loud at several parts. I was stunned into silence by others. She is a hero.

Best of 2006

2006-12-31T20:00:00.000-08:00

Overall, I read 106 books in 2006, 102 of which were mysteries. I always say I'm going to read more "regular" fiction and read some non-fiction, but I rarely seem to get around to it. However, I am reading a non-fiction item right now: Michael Korda's Making the List, which is subtitled "a cultural history of the bestseller." He goes through decade by decade and looks at what the best books of each year were according to Publishers Weekly. It's good for odd factoids if nothing else....for instance, in 1949, three of the top ten non-fiction books were about canasta. Hmmmmm.

I also am waiting for a copy of Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals to become available at the library. We're starting up one of those "what if all the freshmen read the same book" programs and this was on a list of possibles and looked quite interesting.

Looking ahead at mysteries in 2007 - there is a series I recently ran across by David Hewson, set in present day Rome. I thought I had the first one checked out, but realized it was the second one. Am a bit compulsive about reading series in order, so it was put aside.

Looking back on the year just ending...

The best "new to me" mystery series that I read in 2006:

Carol O'Connell - Mallory series

Nancy Pickard - the Jenny Cain series and the Marie Lightfoot series

Barbara Cleverly - Joe Sandilands series

The ten best mysteries read in 2006, in no particular order:

Louise Penny, Still Life

T Jefferson Parker, The Fallen

Greg Iles, Blood Memory

Jan Burke, Kidnapped

Lee Child, The Hard Way

Julia Spencer-Fleming, All Mortal Flesh

P J Tracy, Snowblind

Karin Slaughter, Triptych

Stephen White, Kill Me

Michael Connelly, Echo Park

Best non-mystery fiction read:

Anita Shreve, A Wedding in December

Hope McIntyre, How to Seduce a Ghost (British chick lit with a light mystery element)

Jennifer Weiner, The Guy Not Taken

December reading

2006-12-31T19:57:00.000-08:00

Jan Burke, Kidnapped
Latest in the Irene Kelly series. I felt Bloodlines was so good, this was a bit of a let down, but was very good. One of my favorite series.

Greg Iles, Dead Sleep
Thriller about a woman who is trying to solve her twin sister's kidnapping and is still struggling with her father's disappearance during Vietnam.

Louise Penny, Still Life
FIrst in a series, can't wait for the second one. A police team from Quebec is sent to a small village to solve a murder case. Excellent writing, an incredible cast of characters, very enjoyable.

Greg Iles, The Quiet Game
One of his earlier ones. Good plot, involving a young widower and his daughter returning to his hometown of Natchez and getting involved in an unsolved case from the 60s, but it went on too long. Could have used another edit!

Lee Harris, The Cinco de Mayo Murder
Latest in the Chris Bennett series. I have really enjoyed this series and am willing to overlook the average writing and weak dialogue because the plots are usually entertaining and involve cold cases. This one is a cold case, but Chris' involvement in it is such a stretch, I found myself rolling my eyes a bit.

Robert B Parker, Hundred Dollar Baby
When a minor character is brought back for the third time, does that mean he has totally run out of plot ideas? Not the best in the Spenser series.

Charlaine Harris, Grave Surprise
#2 in the Harper Connelly series. Very enjoyable. Harper has the unusual ability to find dead bodies and identify the cause of death, which she was left with after being struck by lightning. In this one, she has gone to "demonstrate" her skills for a class and she discovers the body of a young girl she had been hired to find years before. Good characters and she makes the supernatural element seem very mundane.

Jennifer Weiner, The Guy Not Taken
Collection of short stories, many of which are very good. Similar themes throughout (dealing with divorced parents, angry siblings, whiny children) but very different in tone and style.

November reads

2006-12-01T19:39:00.000-08:00

Sujata Massey, Girl in a Box
Latest in the Rei Shimura series, this one was pretty disappointing. Rei has become a secret agent of sorts and returns to Japan. The cultural element in this one was fashion and the role of fancy department stores in Japan, just not as interesting as earlier ones.

Lea Wait, Shadows at the Fair
First in the Maggie Simon series, about an antique prints dealer who helps solve a string of murders at a craft fair

Lea Wait, Shadows on the Coast of Maine
Maggie goes to visit an old friend who has moved to Maine and helps solve a murder that happens during her visit

Lea Wait, Shadows on the Ivy
#3 Maggie Simon, focuses on Maggie's other work as an instructor at the local college, where she gets involved with solving the murder of a student

Jacqueline Winspear, Messenger of Truth
Recent in the Maisie Dobbs series, another good one in this interesting series. Maisie is hired to determine whether an artist was murdered or committed suicide, and her investigation takes her back to the artist's experiences during WWI

Lea Wait, Shadows at the Spring Show
Another Maggie Simon, went through these too quickly perhaps, was pretty bored with this one

Julia Spencer-Fleming, All Mortal Flesh
Recent in the Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne series. A really sad one in this superb series. The trouble between Fergusson and Van Alstyne and their relationship has a number of tragic repercussions.

Susan Dunlap, A Single Eye
A new Sue Dunlap! I never thought I'd see the day. Although I wish she would return to the Kiernan O'Shaughnessy series, this was an interesting read about a stuntwoman who solves a mystery while at a Zen retreat.

October

2006-10-31T20:17:00.000-08:00

Slow reading month for me....

Sarah Stewart Taylor, Still as Death
#4 in the Sweeney St George series, this one has an Egyptology theme and finds Sweeney solving a new mystery that is linked to an older one

Elizabeth Bloom, The Mortician's Daughter
Hopefully this will be the first in a series. Main character Ginny Lavoie is a NY police detective who returns to her hometown in northern Massachusetts when the son of a friend is killed. Good mystery, plus some humor. This is the name Beth Saulnier is publishing under these days (series from the 1990s about a reporter in a thinly veiled Ithaca).

Jeff Abbott, Fear
Not as good as it could have been. A man in the witness protection program gets pulled into a case involving a new medicine.

Steve Hamilton, A Stolen Season
Latest in the Alex McKnight series, good story but some sad plot twists.

Jonnie Jacobs, The Only Suspect
Very enjoyable. A man with a past is accused of his wife's murder. First person narration from his point of view, coupled with third-person narrative from the pov of the detective, Hannah Montgomery.

September

2006-09-30T13:24:00.000-07:00

Can't believe September is gone already. A good month of reading, though.

Ruth Rendell, End in Tears, A-
Latest Inspector Wexford, quite well done, seemed slow-paced a bit, but worth it.

Michael Connelly, Echo Park, A+
Latest Harry Bosch -- got an ARC to review this for Library Journal, lucky girl that I am. Excellent, excellent, excellent.

Margaret Maron, Winter's Child, A
Latest in the Deborah Knott series, one of my favorite series.

Karin Slaughter, Triptych, A+
Not part of the Sara Linton series, but we will forgive her. A richly layered, suspenseful tale, to say the least. Her work is graphic, but worth it. There is a twist at the end of the first section that literally made my jaw drop open and sent me back through looking for clues and hints. She is so damned good.

Greg Iles, Blood Memory, B+
Had never read one of his. Pretty well done, a little corny, the main character is just a little too flawed, etc. Plot involves repressed memories of sexual abuse - definitely not a light hearted romp here.

Iris Johansen, Blind Alley, A-
In this one, Eve Duncan's adopted daughter Jane is 17 and being stalked by a psycho killer. Interesting plot twists involving Roman history.

Iris Johansen, Countdown, B
Jane is now 21 and at the center of an international intrigue. Little too farfetched and too much romance novel aspect (read gushy sex scenes).

Morag Joss, Funeral Music, A
First in the Sara Selkirk series - Sara is a cellist who gets involved with solving a murder at the arts center. She gives cello lessons to a police detective and teams up with him in solving the case.

Christopher Fowler, Full Dark House, A
Begins in present day London, with a pair of octogenarian special detectives, but most of the novel takes place during World War II, when they worked their first case together. Well done.

Jodi Compton, Sympathy Between Humans, B-
And I'm an easy grader. I wasn't too impressed with the first one she wrote, but for some reason picked this up at the library. Way too many plot convolutions and a heroine so flawed it isn't even interesting.

C J Box, In Plain Sight, A-
Recent Joe Pickett. Joe and his family are targeted by someone with an axe to grind from a case in the past. Well written, interesting characters.

August reading

2006-09-02T09:31:00.000-07:00

August went by in a blur. A busy month, plus I was knitting a lot and reading less. Some good ones, though, and lots of good new releases on the horizon for fall.

Jill Paton Walsh, Debts of Dishonor, A
After a long hiatus, Imogen Quy returns. Plot involves shady financial dealings that affect the college and the possible murder of an alumni.

Susan Wittig Albert, Bleeding Hearts, A
Latest China Bayles. China gets involved in a case involving the local football coach. Good character development as always.

Maggie Sefton, A Deadly Yarn, A
#3 Kelly Flynn. When a friend dies unexpectedly, Kelly and her friends can't believe it was suicide and uncover the truth.

PJ Tracy, Snow Blind, A
Latest in the Monkeewrench/Magozzi/et al series. Another excellent page-turner. What a diabolical way to hide a body!

Laurie R King, The Art of Detection, A-
Finally, Kate Martinelli returns! I'm not the biggest Sherlock Holmes fan, so the "lost" story inserted in the middle was not of great interest, but the plot was good overall.

Rett MacPherson, Dead Man Running, B
Recent Torie O'Shea. Not the strongest of the series. The characters were more annoying than charming this time out, and the plot twists were a bit strained.

July reading

2006-08-01T13:57:00.000-07:00

Slow month for reading for me, but good ones.

Stuart Woods, Two Dollar Bill, A-
second most recent Stone Barrington, cheesy as always, but entertaining! Bonus: an excellent tip about making gimlets.

Stuart Woods, Dark Harbor, A-
most recent Stone Barrington, decent plot involving the murder of Stone's distant cousin, a typical Barrington in terms of lots of sex and consumption.

Robert B Parker, Blue Screen, A-
most recent Sunny Randall, not the best Parker ever, but entertaining enough. Not sure how I feel about Sunny and her new romance -- there are already so many connections between the three series that often feel contrived.

Marcia Muller, Vanishing Point, A
A summer tradition, the new McCone. (Well, I wish we were still getting a McCone each year, even though I do like the Cape Perdido series too.) McCone takes on a cold case, seeking the truth about a woman's disappearance. The client is the woman's daughter who is obsessed with her mother's disappearance and the effects it had on her life.

John Harvey, Darkness and Light, A
Most recent Frank Elder. Frank gets involved in a case as a favor to his ex-wife, looking for the sister of one of her friends. When the woman is found dead, Frank sees links with one of his old unsolved cases and is pulled back into service as a consultant. Dark, creepy stuff again, but well-written with interesting, flawed characters.

June reads

2006-07-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

Barbara Cleverly, The Palace Tiger, A-
4th in the Joe Sandilands series, read the first three in May, enjoyable series set in 1920s India

Jennifer Weiner, Goodnight Nobody, A
Funny chicklit mystery, with a frazzled mother solving a mystery out in the suburbs. (As foreign to me as the previous book's setting, but still a fun read!)

PJ Parrish, An Unquiet Grave, A
Recent Louis Kincaid. Kincaid goes home to Michigan to help his foster father discover the truth about a missing friend.

Tess Gerritsen, The Mephisto Club, A
Reviewed this one for Library Journal - will be published in September. It's the latest Rizzoli/Isles and it's good!!!

JA Konrath, Bloody Mary, A-
Second in the Jack Daniels series, think I liked the first one best.

Linda Barnes, Heart of the World, A
Recent Carlotta Carlyle. This one got off to a slow start but was worth it. Very differently paced than her others, but very well done and a good story.

Lee Child, The Hard Way, A+
I look forward to the new Reacher book every year, I promise myself I'll savor it, and then I stay up half the night reading the darn thing anyway. How does he consistently outdo himself with every book? Understatement: this is another great read in the Jack Reacher series.

Peter Robinson, Piece of my Heart, A
Latest Alan Banks. Banks has had some rough times in the last couple of books and this one finds him back on his feet and taking on a case that reaches back to 1969. I enjoyed the references to the music of that era, and part of the book is told from the point of view of the detective investigating the original case in 1969. I really like this series, and this was good, although quite different, given the flashbacks and narrative techniques.

May booklist

2006-05-31T22:09:00.000-07:00

Read more than I expected to, mostly because I was on a three-legged plane trip early in the month. I also read quite a bit over the holiday weekend. The month was pretty stressful, with the job interview and finishing the final draft of my book after I got back from the trip to LOEX and to visit my parents. Summer is finally beginning, maybe.

Lee Harris, Murder in Greenwich Village, A
Latest in the Jane Bauer/cold case series, enjoyable

Maggie Sefton, Needled to Death, A-
#2 Kelly Flynn, set in a thinly disguised Ft Collins Colorado, has a knitting shop theme. This time Kelly solves the murder of a local weaver.

Clare Curzon, Body of a Woman, A
Mike Yeadings and the team solve a tricky murder case. Yeadings had met the victim once and becomes a bit obsessed with the case.

Barbara Cleverly, The Last Kashmiri Rose, A
First in the Joe Sandilands series, set in India, 1922, very enjoyable.

Clare Curzon, A Meeting of Minds, A
Another Yeadings, with a murder case where all the suspects are part of the family.

Mary Higgins Clark, Two Little Girls in Blue, B-
Not her best.

Carolyn Hart, Dead Days of Summer, A-
Recent Death on Demand entry. Max is framed for murder.

John Lescroart, The Oath, A
Getting back into this series. Dismas Hardy takes a case that pulls him into medical fraud. Well done.

Barbara Cleverly, Ragtime in Simla, A
#2 Joe Sandilands, also enjoyable, with Joe being pulled into a case just when he thinks he's heading back to London.

David Handler, Sweet Golden Parachute, A-
Latest Berger/Mitry, I like this series a lot.

Sarah Stewart Taylor, Judgment of the Grave, A
Funerary art expert Sweeney St. George returns, becoming embroiled in a present day murder and a Revolutionary War era mystery. Excellent.

David Rosenfelt, Dead Center, A-
Recent one in the Andy Carpenter series. Some LOL moments, while Andy is drawn to Wisconsin to work on a case Laurie is connected to.

J A Konrath, Whiskey Sour, A-
First Jacqueline "Jack" Daniels. Chicago police detective Daniels is tracking down a creepy serial killer. I had to skim over some of those short chapters from the killer's point of view, but I liked Jack a lot.

Barbara Cleverly, The Damascened Blade, A-
#3 Sandilands. Poor Joe just can't get out of India. He is asked to accompany a young American on a trip and gets involved in solving another murder.

Sandra Scoppetone, This Dame for Hire, A-
First in the Faye Quick WWII series. Faye takes over the agency when her boss goes away to war. The slang and dialogue drove me nuts at first, but the story was good, so I just kept with it. Will look for more in this series.

T Jefferson Parker, The Fallen, A-
Newer one from him, about a homicide detective who was left with synesthesia after being thrown out of a building. He can see colors when people speak, so he knows when people are lying, anxious, happy, etc.. Kind of a weird aspect, but it doesn't get in the way of a solid crime story, with Robbie solving the murder of a fellow investigator.

April books

2006-05-31T22:06:00.000-07:00

Behind again. Sigh. Here was April.

Lisa Miscione, Smoke, A-
Latest in the Lydia Strong series

Robert Parker, Sea Change, A-
Latest in the Jesse Stone series.

Hope McIntyre, How to Seduce a Ghost, A
An enjoyable British mystery about a ghost writer who gets involved in crime solving, kind of a cross between a mystery and chicklit

Nancy Pickard, IOU, A
Continuing to race through the Jenny Cain series

Nancy Pickard, But I Wouldn't Want to Die There, A
Jenny goes to New York to solve the murder of a friend.

Stephen White, Kill Me, A
Latest Alan Gregory, but Alan plays a minor role in this one. Excellent suspense.

Brian Freeman, Immoral, A-
Strong debut novel, but I knew who was the villain was going to be too early on.

Nancy Pickard, Confession, A
Jenny and Geof deal with a surprise in their lives.

Nancy Pickard, Twilight, A
Sorry to see this series end.

Charlaine Harris, Grave Sight, A
A new series from Harris about a young woman who was struck by lightning and left with an unusual gift – she is able to find dead people.

John Harvey, Ash and Bone, A
Second in the Frank Elder series. Good British PI fare.

Marjorie Eccles, Untimely Graves, A-
One of the local public libraries just joined a new consortium, so I have access to a wider array of books. Will be catching up on Eccles, Curzon and other hard to find Brits, yay! This one is an Inspector Gil Mayo from a few years back.

James Swain, Mr. Lucky, A-
Tony Valentine, former cop, expert at gambling fraud, takes on another case.

A Reading Survey

2006-04-13T19:55:00.000-07:00

Via Brandon via Fido the Yak. Instructions: Bold the works you've read, italicize the works you might like to read, place question marks by the authors you've never heard of, place an asterisk by authors if you've read any of their other works.

*Alcott, Louisa May--Little Women
*Allende, Isabel--The House of Spirits
Angelou, Maya--I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
*Atwood, Margaret--Cat's Eye
*Austen, Jane--Emma
Bambara, Toni Cade--Salt Eaters
Barnes, Djuna--Nightwood
de Beauvoir, Simone--The Second Sex
*Blume, Judy--Are You There God It's Me Margaret
Burnett, Frances--The Secret Garden
Bronte, Charlotte--Jane Eyre
Bronte, Emily--Wuthering Heights
Buck, Pearl S.--The Good Earth
Byatt, A.S.--Possession
Cather, Willa--My Antonia
*Chopin, Kate--The Awakening
*Christie, Agatha--Murder on the Orient Express
*Cisneros, Sandra--The House on Mango Street
Clinton, Hillary Rodham--Living History
Cooper, Anna Julia--A Voice From the South
Danticat, Edwidge--Breath, Eyes, Memory
Davis, Angela--Women, Culture, and Politics
Desai, Anita--Clear Light of Day
Dickinson, Emily--Collected Poems
Duncan, Lois--I Know What You Did Last Summer
DuMaurier, Daphne--Rebecca
*Eliot, George--Middlemarch
*Emecheta, Buchi--Second Class Citizen
*Erdrich, Louise--Tracks
*Esquivel, Laura--Like Water for Chocolate
*Flagg, Fannie--Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
Friedan, Betty--The Feminine Mystique
Frank, Anne--Diary of a Young Girl
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins--The Yellow Wallpaper
*Gordimer, Nadine--July's People
*Grafton, Sue--S is for Silence
Hamilton, Edith--Mythology
*Highsmith, Patricia--The Talented Mr. Ripley
*hooks, bell--Bone Black
*Hurston, Zora Neale--Dust Tracks on the Road
Jacobs, Harriet--Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Jackson, Helen Hunt--Ramona
*Jackson, Shirley--The Haunting of Hill House
Jong, Erica--Fear of Flying
Keene, Carolyn--The Nancy Drew Mysteries (any of them)
Kidd, Sue Monk--The Secret Life of Bees
Kincaid, Jamaica--Lucy
*Kingsolver, Barbara--The Poisonwood Bible
*Kingston, Maxine Hong--The Woman Warrior
*Larsen, Nella--Passing
*L'Engle, Madeleine--A Wrinkle in Time
Le Guin, Ursula K.--The Left Hand of Darkness
Lee, Harper--To Kill a Mockingbird
*Lessing, Doris--The Golden Notebook
*Lively, Penelope--Moon Tiger
Lorde, Audre--The Cancer Journals
Martin, Ann M.--The Babysitters Club Series (any of them)
McCullers, Carson--The Member of the Wedding
*McMillan, Terry--Disappearing Acts
Markandaya, Kamala--Nectar in a Sieve
Marshall, Paule--Brown Girl, Brownstones
Mitchell, Margaret--Gone with the Wind
Montgomery, Lucy--Anne of Green Gables
?Morgan, Joan--When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost
*Morrison, Toni--Song of Solomon
Murasaki, Lady Shikibu--The Tale of Genji
Munro, Alice--Lives of Girls and Women
*Murdoch, Iris--A Severed Head
*Naylor, Gloria--Mama Day
Niffenegger, Audrey--The Time Traveller's Wife
*Oates, Joyce Carol--We Were the Mulvaneys
O'Connor, Flannery--A Good Man is Hard to Find
*Piercy, Marge--Woman on the Edge of Time
*Picoult, Jodi--My Sister's Keeper
*Plath, Sylvia--The Bell Jar
Porter, Katharine Anne--Ship of Fools
*Proulx, E. Annie--The Shipping News
Rand, Ayn--The Fountainhead
Ray, Rachel--365: No Repeats
Rhys, Jean--Wide Sargasso Sea
Robinson, Marilynne--Housekeeping
?Rocha, Sharon--For Laci
Sebold, Alice--The Lovely Bones
Shelley, Mary--Frankenstein
Smith, Betty--A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Smith, Zadie--White Teeth
Spark, Muriel--The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Spyri, Johanna--Heidi
?Strout, Elizabeth--Amy and Isabelle
*Steel, Danielle--The House
*Tan, Amy--The Joy Luck Club
*Tannen, Deborah--You're Wearing That
*Ulrich, Laurel--A Midwife's Tale
Urquhart, Jane--Away
*Walker, Alice--The Temple of My Familiar
*Welty, Eudora--One Writer's Beginnings
*Wharton, Edith--Age of Innocence
*Wilder, Laura Ingalls--Little House in the Big Woods
Wollstonecraft, Mary--A Vindication of the Rights of Women
*Woolf, Virginia--A Room of One's Own

March reading

2006-04-04T20:10:00.000-07:00

Nancy Pickard, The Ring of Truth, A
#2 in the Marie Lightfoot trilogy, another interesting case with Lightfoot investigating another true crime topic

Nancy Pickard, The Truth Hurts, A
#3 Marie Lightfoot, this time she is targeted by a psycho and must investigate the truth about her parents and their past

Linda Fairstein, Death Dance, B
Latest Alex Cooper, this one was OK, but way too many plot lines veering all over the place.

Carol O'Connell, Stone Angel, A
Wow. Mallory goes to Louisiana to investigate her mother's murder and her own childhood.

Nancy Pickard, Generous Death, A
First in the Jenny Cain series. Funny, well-written and not as dated as I worried it would be. I don't know why I never got around to these. Set in a fictional town in Massachusetts, Cain is the director of a civic foundation.

Nancy Pickard, Say No to Murder, A
Second Jenny Cain, also quite funny.

Nancy Pickard, No Body, A
Jenny solves two cases, one present day and one historical, involving graves/funeral homes.

Martha Grimes, The Old Wine Shades, B
Recent Jury/Plant. Slow to start, with an annoying finish. The twist in the plot was so effective, though - I never saw it coming and it was just great.

Nancy Pickard, Marriage is Murder, A
Jenny gets pulled into a series of cases involving domestic violence. An interesting mix of humorous characters and serious subjects.

Nancy Pickard, Dead Crazy, A
This one has Jenny solving cases while trying to help the plight of the mentally ill.

Nancy Pickard, Bum Steer, A-
Jenny goes to Kansas when the foundation is left a ranch by a man no one knows.

January 2006

2006-02-24T22:18:00.000-08:00

One of the slowest months I've had in a long while but some good ones.

Sandra Dallas, New Mercies, A-
Another historical novel with a slight bit of mystery from Dallas (Persian Pickle Club, etc). A woman from the North goes South when a relative she didn't knew she had is murdered and leaves her the estate. Enjoyable Southern setting and good characters.

Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, Dear Departed, A
Latest Bill Slider mystery. I like these so much I buy them in hardback as soon as I can since the library where I live now doesn't seem to realize she exists. For someone who spent $0.00 buying mysteries before moving here, it's saying a lot. Slider and Atherton tackle a case that appears to be another in a string of serial killings but turns out to be quite different.

Carol O'Connell, Mallory's Oracle, A
Finally getting around to reading this series. I know this is one that has split readers into two camps, but as you can tell from my rating, I really liked it.

Jo Bannister, The Lazarus Hotel, A-
A standalone from her. A group of people arrive for a weekend personal enrichment-type workshop and discover they've been brought together for a sinister reason. Very suspenseful.

Donna Andrews, Murder with Peacocks, A-
I had started this one awhile back and couldn't get into it. Decided to give her another try. Cute and funny.

Donna Andrews, Murder for Puffins, A-
Again, cute and funny, but decided I'd better pace these out.

Anita Shreve, A Wedding in December, A-
Some of the critics really hated this one, but I thought it was pretty good. A group of friends from high school reunite for a wedding. The bride and groom were sweethearts who married others and found each other later. Lots of entertwining stories of the group's lives, and an interesting story-within-story aspect (one of the women is an aspiring writer and is writing a novel based on a World War I event).

Stuart MacBride, Cold Granite, A
Not for the faint of heart. First in a series, set in Aberdeen, police procedural. Great characters, solid writing, but I must disclose that there's lots of forensic details and the cases involve the kidnapping and murder of children.

2005 in Review

2006-02-24T22:14:00.000-08:00

This is my Year in Review message that was posted to femmystery@yahoogroups.

In 2005, I read 158 books - 131 mysteries, 27 fiction.

The best series that I discovered and/or finally got around to reading in 2005:

Martha Grimes - Plant & Jury series

John Connolly - Charlie Parker series

Laurie R King - Mary Russell & Sherlock Holmes series

My top 10 mystery novels read during 2005 (no particular order):

Jan Burke, Bloodlines
Robert Crais, The Forgotten Man
Elizabeth George, With No One As Witness
Lee Child, One Shot
PJ Tracy, Dead Run
Denise Mina, Deception
Michael Connelly, The Lincoln Lawyer
Karin Slaughter, Faithless
Jeffrey Deaver, The Twelfth Card
Jill McGown, Unlucky for Some

My top choices in fiction this year:

Kate Atkinson, Case Histories (sort of a mystery)

Reginald Hill, The Stranger House (sort of a mystery)

Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Shadow of the Wind (also sort of a mystery :-)

Melissa Bank, The Wonder Spot

Jess Walter, Citizen Vince

Penny Vincenzi, No Angel, Something Dangerous, Into Temptation (trilogy)

Just for the record...August-December 2005

2006-02-24T21:50:00.000-08:00

So, daily blogging is obviously not my strong suit. Ah, well. I do keep up with my trusty notebook, though, so all is not lost. Here's a huge catch up list....

August list:

Reginald Hill, The Stranger House, A
A standalone I reviewed for Library Journal – about two people who are both drawn to a small village in search of their family histories. Sort of a mystery, but much more.

Martha Grimes, Rainbow's End, A
Anyone else would just have a hunch, but Macalvie knows beyond a doubt that the deaths of three women must be connected. Jury heads off to New Mexico in search of clues.

Jack Kerley, The Hundredth Man, A-
Carson Ryder, a cop with a past, works for a special unit of the Mobile police. Lots of humor mixed in with the chase for a super-creepy serial killer.

Martha Grimes, The Case Has Altered, A
Picking up a loose end from the previous book, Jury and Plant investigate when chum Jenny Kennington is suspected of murder. Meanwhile, Agatha files another frivolous lawsuit.

Martha Grimes, The Stargazey, A
A case involving art fraud, murder, mistaken identity and more haunts Jury. More serious in tone, although the Cripps family is always a light touch.

Martha Grimes, The Lamorna Wink, B+
Jury spends most of this one off in Northern Ireland while Plant teams up with Macalvie to solve a rather gruesome murder of two children (no wonder Jury took off - to avoid dealing with this plot! :-)

John Connolly, The Black Angel, A
Charlie Parker returns in another creepy adventure, this time taking on a sect of murderous religious fanatics with a long history. Lots of historical detail in this one – maybe too much.

Perri O'Shaughnessy, Case of Lies, A-
Nina Reilly gets involved with a civil case stemming from an incident where a woman died during a robbery at a motel. Nina tries to find the three robbery victims/witnesses and finds herself at peril in a bizarre case. Some of the narrative meanders while it follows the young math geniuses who were robbed, but a pretty good mystery.

Martha Grimes, The Blue Last, A
The subplot with Plant running around Italy was a bit tiresome, when the main plot is so good here. Jury's memories of his childhood during the war are brought to the surface as he investigates a case that began during the Blitz.

Jonathon King, The Blue Edge of Midnight, A-
Max Freeman was a cop in Philadelphia, but after a bad shooting takes a retirement option and moves to Florida. When he finds a body near his cabin, he gets pulled in a serial killer case.

Jonathon King, A Visible Darkness, A-
Max helps his friend/lawyer Billy Sheridan with an insurance fraud case that turns ugly.

Jonathan Coe, The Rotters Club, A
Fiction – set in 1970s Britain, follows four young men through ages 14-18 or so. Excellent writing, lots of period detail in terms of music and politics, with a good mix of humor and sadness.

Elizabeth Bloom, See Isabelle Run, B
Standalone mystery by Beth Saulnier (who wrote the series about Alex somebody, a woman journalist in a thinly disguised Ithaca setting). Isabelle Leonard gets a job with a media conglomerate run by a domestic diva and uncovers a string of murders. Madcap at times, but not cozy. Entertaining but predictable.

Elaine Viets, Just Murdered, B
The latest in the “Dead End Job Mystery”series. A fun read, but not the best of series.

Grace Grant and PJ MacAllister, Flyover States, B
Authors (real names Allison Umminger and Dana Johnson) both went to graduate school at Indiana University (where I went). This is a light romantic comedy about their life as two women, one from New York, one from LA, who end up studying English at a big univresity in a small town in the midwest. If it wasn't for the particular connection I have to the setting, I probably never would have read this, but it was entertaining enough.

Laura Lippman, To the Power of Three, A
Regardless of what any reviewers say, Lippman again proves that she has much more to say than she does in her comic noir PI novels about Tess Monaghan (which I adore, don't get me wrong). As in her previous standalone Every Secret Thing, Lippman explores the psyche of adolescent girls. The novel opens with a shooting incident at a high school and then jumps back and forth in time as we meet three friends and trace the development of their friendship throughout the years and discover what led to the shooting.

Melissa Bank, The Wonder Spot, A
Second book from the author of The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing, which I adored. It’s similar in plot to Girls Guide, that is, it’s a series of chapters that trace a woman’s life from adolescence onward without being complete in chronology (large chunks of time are missing, new characters in one chapter are actually old friends), but I thought this one was even better than the first. Strong writing, good characters and a mix of humor and poignancy.

September list:

Jonathon King - Shadow Men - A-
3rd in the Max Freeman series, with Max and Billy uncovering a case linked to the time of the building of the Tamiami Road across Florida.

Maggie Sefton - Knit One, Kill Two - A-
A young woman returns home to Fort Conner, CO (a thinly disguised Fort Collins) after her beloved aunt is killed during a robbery. She doesn't believe the police explanation and begins investigating the case. Very well done for a first novel/cozy/paperback only!

Marcia Muller - Cape Perdido - A-
Another in the series set in Soledad County. In this one, an environmental group is trying to save the water and an old crime comes back to haunt them. Short chapters told from different characters' point of view made this very choppy for my taste, but still an enjoyable read.

Giles Blunt - Black Fly Season - A-
3rd in the John Cardinal/Lise Delorme series. A psycho killer is on the loose in northern Ontario. Great characters, including a flawed hero, and strong writing make this one of my favorite series.

Cassandra Chan - The Young Widow - A-
Hope this is the first in a series! Gibbons and Carmichael of Scotland Yard (who have apparently been featured in short stories she has published) often solve crimes with the help of Gibbons' aristocratic friend Bethancourt. In this one, a woman whose third older husband has died is charged with his murder. Gibbons falls for her...is she really innocent or using him?

Jonathan Coe - The Closed Circle - A-
Sequel to the Rotters Club, less funny but well done. Set during 1999-2003, the story tells of what happened to the four young men and their families that we met in the 1970s in the first novel.

John Harvey - Flesh and Blood - A
Retired DI Frank Elder has tried to escape his past but he gets involved in a case that ties into an unsolved disappearance 14 years prior. Excellent. Will look for more of his.

Adriana Trigliani - Rococo - B
Set in 1970 in New Jersey, features an interior designer named Bartolomeo di Crespi, his extended family and friends. Some humor, but I got tired of the characters. Lucia Lucia was so much better.

Anne Bartlett - Knitting - A
Australian fiction. A widow who teaches textile history and a woman with a passion for knitting meet by chance when they are the only two people to stop and help a man who collapsed in the street. They become friends of sorts. I enjoyed this story of friendship, coping with grief and creating a life. Not a frothy chicklit; rather serious in tone.

Jeffery Deaver - The Twelfth Card - A+
Latest in the Lincoln Rhyme series, a roller coaster of shifting suspects and motives, including a puzzling family history, constitutional law, and a modern day contract killer. Good stuff.

Jhumpa Lahiri - The Namesake - A-
Story begins in 1967, as a young Bengali woman who has come to America with her husband awaits the birth of her first child. The focus shifts over time to this son as he becomes an adult. Fascinating look at Indian culture and culture clashes through the 1970s, 80s and 90s.

Dana Cameron - Site Unseen - A-
First in the Emma Fielding series, Emma is an archaelogy professor who has uncovered an important site, which sets off a series of murders. Good use of humor and accurate accounting of academia.

October list

Tess Gerritsen, Vanish, A
Latest in the Jane Rizzoli/Maura Isles series. A drowning victim unexpectedly wakes up in the morgue and later takes hostages at the hospital. Jane becomes embroiled in the case, which involves trafficking of women from eastern Europe. One of my favorite series.

Lee Harris, The Silver Anniversary Murder, B
I still like the characters and this plot is pretty interesting, but the writing is not the strongest. Sometimes I don't care, but often weak sloppy writing bugs me.

Margaret Maron, Rituals of the Season, A
Latest in the Deborah Knott series. Set a few weeks before Christmas and and the big wedding, she gets involved in a case involving the death of an attorney that may link to an earlier case.

Karin Slaughter, Faithless, A+
Latest in the Sara Linton series. While on a walk Sara and Jeffrey stumble over a pipe that leads to a chamber with a body. Another complex, complicated, creepy book.

Ed McBain, Fiddlers, A
Can't believe this is (probably) the last 87th Precinct novel. A series of seemingly unrelated murders turns out to have a rather surprising connection.

Lowen Clausen, First Avenue, C
Really wanted to like this but just couldn't get into the characters. It went on a bit too long.

Elinor Lipman, Isabel's Bed, A
A woman fleeing a floundering career and a failed relationship escapes Manhattan to take on a ghostwriting job on Cape Cod. I like Lipman's sense of humor.
Diana O'Hehir, Murder Never Forgets, B
First in a series about a young woman whose father is in early stage Alzheimers. He claims he witnessed a murder and she isn't sure what to think, but gets drawn into the case.

Denise Mina, Field of Blood, A+
First in the Patricia "Paddy" Meehan series. Set in Glasgow in 1981, Paddy is a gofer at the newspaper and dreams of being a journalist. She has a connection to a case that has captured the country's attention, and she gets involved in the investigation, with tragic results. Another strong anti-hero from Mina.
Jeff Abbott, Panic, A-
I've enjoyed both of his earlier series (Jordan Poteet, Whit Mosley). This is a standalone thriller about a young man whose life is not what he has thought. A bit stretched at times, but kept me turning pages.

Martha Grimes, The Grave Maurice, A
While recuperating from injuries, Jury begins wondering about his doctor's missing daughter. Shortly after he begins to investigate in earnest, she returns. An interesting case linked to horse racing.

Laurie R. King, The Beekeeper's Apprentice, A+
Why did I wait so long to try this series? (Well, probably because I was never much of a Sherlock Holmes fan, but anyway....) A delightful read!

Beth Gutcheon, Leeway Cottage, A
Spanning several generations, tells the story of a family. Particular attention is paid to the WWII era. Very well written, nice mix of humor and poignancy.

November list

Jacqueline Winspear, Pardonable Lies, A-
#3 Maisie Dobbs - Maisie has two interlocking cases that force her to return to France and face her memories

Laurie R King, A Monstrous Regiment of Women, A- #2 Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes - After reading the first in October, was glad to continue with this one

Michael Connelly, The Lincoln Lawyer, A
Mickey Haller #1? (according to the article on Connelly in the latest Mystery News, Mickey will appear again but maybe in a Bosch) - A really well done legal thriller with a flawed hero

Laurie R King - A Letter of Mary, A
#3 Russell/Holmes - I liked this one, with Russ tracing the clues in the letter that lead to the murderer of a friend

David Handler - Bright Orange Sunrise, A
#4 Mitch Berger and Des Mitry series - Mitch and Des are snowed in at an estate when murders begin occurring

Jonathon King, A Killing Night, B+
#4 Max Freeman - a number of cases intertwine here, including Max helping some immigrants who were injured on the job and a string of murders of young women

Martha Grimes, Winds of Change, A
How sad! All caught up with the Jury series. This was a good one, although dark, with Jury investigating the death of a child, a possible pedophilia ring and an old kidnapping case that may connect.

Lily King, The English Teacher, B
Non-mystery, an oddly paced novel about a woman who reluctantly marries and merges her son in with her new husband's children. It begins right before the Iran hostage crisis and ends when that does; the news of the events underpins some of the character development and interaction. Interesting but odd.

Peter Lovesey, The Circle, A+
I love Lovesey. Although the cover says Peter Diamond makes an appearance, it is little more than this. Henrietta Mallin, who collaborated with Diamond in the previous novel, is the central sleuth here. The plot involves murder among a writing circle. Excellent.

Jo Bannister, Breaking Faith - A-
#5 Brodie Farrell - This one involves a rock star who moves to the area and then things get interesting when a body is found buried on the grounds. Tricky plot although the hard rock music elements seem a little cheezy or dated.

Martha Grimes, Belle Ruin, A
Ah, Emma Graham returns, Emma being the 12 year old protagonist of Hotel Paradise and Cold Flat Junction, who sees a mystery every where she turns (she says this in the new book). A bit slow paced, but charming.
Patricia Hall, Deep Freeze, A
#8 Thackeray and Ackroyd - when a girl is shot outside a women's clinic, it is unclear whether she was the intended victim or what the motive was, as they uncover a number of shady doings at the clinic

Patricia Hall, Death in Dark Waters - A
#9 Thackeray and Ackroyd - in this one, Michael and Laura get caught up in a series of intertwined cases involving race, class, drugs, corruption, etc. An enjoyable series.

Laurie R. King, The Moor - B
This one moved pretty slowly for my taste, although it was well-written and the series has great characters.

Edna Buchanan, Shadows - A-
#2 Cold Case Squad - KC Riley and her team take on a cold case that has a new twist, while one of the detectives tries to solve his own cold case, the unsolved murder of his parents, who were killed when he was a child

Kate Wilhelm, The Deepest Water - A
A standalone thriller that I had never gotten around to reading. Involves a woman who is trying to solve her father's murder. Very suspenseful!

Kate Wilhelm, Skeletons - A
Another standalone featuring a young woman who housesits for her grandfather and uncovers a family secret that turns dangerous.

Jim Lehrer, The Franklin Affair - A
Light mystery featuring historians who specialize in Ben Franklin and the Revolutionary period of US History dealing with a possible historical mystery and other issues, like a plagiarism case.

Jess Walter, Citizen Vince - A
Set in Spokane in 1980, features Vince, a low level mob guy who's in witness protection and is trying to make a life for himself. His past comes to haunt him when another mobster is placed in witness protection in Spokane, but this novel offers more than action. With his new identity, Vince receives a voter registration card (due to his early entry into a life of crime, he'd been a felon prohibited from voting since he was old enough to vote). He takes his responsibility as a new voter very seriously, and the book deals with the politics of the time. I was too young to vote that year (and I noticed the author was born the same year I was), but the 1980 election was the first one I really paid attention to, so I found this part of the novel very interesting.

Robert Parker, School Days - A-
I love Spenser. I even enjoy his other series with Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall. I do wish, though, that they would use a normal size font and margins and just let them be published as thin books. I get tired of turning the pages so fast :-) At any rate, this one involves Spenser investigating the aftermath of a school shooting incident. Hawk is not involved at all, alas, but Susan spends most of the book away on a consulting job, so it's not all bad :-)

P.D. James, The Lighthouse - A
Most recent Adam Dalgliesh, gets off to a bit of a slow start, but I may have also been distracted with holiday things. A murder occurs on a remote island that is used by dignataries and important businessmen as a retreat. Dalgliesh and his team are sent to solve the case. An interesting twist on the locked room style.

Kate Wilhelm, The Price of Silence - A-
Recent standalone featuring a woman who gets a job at a newspaper in a small town and uncovers the fact that a number of young girls have disappeared from town over the years with little investigation or concern.

Sujata Massey, The Typhoon Lover - B-
Most recent Rei Shimura - this one was a bit too far fetched in its setup, the plot lagged, and I'm tired of the on-again, off-again relationship with Hugh. Particularly disappointing given how strong the last one (The Pearl Diver) was.

Sue Grafton, S is for Silence - A
Recent Kinsey Millhone. We're up to September 1987 in Kinsey Time. Kinsey is hired to look into a 34-year old case, the disappearance of a woman from a small town. I liked the technique she used, where some chapters are told from the point of view of the people involved in the case and that those chapters are set in 1953, right before the woman disappeared.

July reading

2005-07-31T22:12:00.000-07:00

Val McDermid – The Distant Echo – A

Standalone, about four young men who find a murdered woman in 1978 and become suspects, although the case is never solved; years later, the case is reopened under a cold case squad and someone is killing off the four former suspects…

Jill Churchill – A Midsummer Night’s Scream – B

Jane and Shelly get involved in a case involving an amateur theatre production. I don’t read a lot of cozies but I’ve always liked this series.

Joseph Finder – Company Man – A-

Very suspenseful tale of a widower who is dealing with corporate backstabbing and troubled kids. Then one night, his life gets very complicated. The ending was a little too conveniently happy, but what a nail-biter this one was.

Joan Brady – Bleedout – A

Intriguing. Parallel narratives of a blind lawyer who is murdered and the man he saved from wrongful conviction. One of the story lines is in the present with the man working to solve the murder of the lawyer, while the other story line is the lawyer’s diary, recounting the past and all events up until his murder.

Martha Grimes – The Old Silent – B

Ran a bit long, but was enjoyable. The rock music references were soooo dated.

Martha Grimes – The Old Contemptibles – A-

Melrose goes undercover searching for clues about the suicide? murder? of a woman Jury had begun a relationship with. Ending somewhat unsatisfying as a cast of kids and seniors take justice into their own hands at the end.

Susan Wittig Albert – Dead Man’s Bones – B+

Most recent China Bayles – an old crime and a new case merge together. Not the greatest entry in the series but enjoyable.

Lee Child – One Shot - A

Usual reaction: WOW. Reacher is summoned to a town in Southern Indiana (unidentified, but seemed like Evansville to me) that has suffered a sniper attack.

Denise Mina – Garnethill - A

First in the trilogy about Maureen O’Donnell, a troubled woman who finds her ex-boyfriend murdered in her kitchen. Everyone, even Maureen’s mother, thinks she did it, so to clear her name, she stumbles into investigating the case. Excellent writing, interesting characters. Not a lot of gory or gratuitous violence, but Mina describes a bleak urban world in Glasgow, the mistreatment of mentally ill patients and surviving sexual abuse in a blunt, relentless fashion.

Martha Grimes – The Horse You Came In On – C

A rather generous grade, considering that I didn’t really finish this one. I expected to like it, as I usually do enjoy mysteries with an Edgar Allan Poe theme, but Jury and the gang in Baltimore was just annoying. Skimmed to see whodunit.

Denise Mina – Deception – A+

Standalone. A psychologist is convicted of murdering a patient, who had been convicted of serial killings but later released. Her husband begins going through her files, looking for material for her appeal, and uncovers all sorts of things. The novel is written as his diary, and he is not a reliable narrator, which makes the suspense even more intense.

Denise Mina – Exile – A

Second in the O’Donnell trilogy. Maureen and her friend Leslie look into the disappearance of a woman who had been at the domestic violence shelter they work at. Maureen ends up in London tracking down a killer.

Leslie Glass - A Clean Kill - A-

Latest in the April Woo/Mike Sanchez series. A wealthy woman is killed and her nanny is the prime suspect. Then her friend is killed and her nanny looks to be the prime suspect. Quite suspenseful, with a twist at the end.

Julia Spencer-Fleming - To Darkness and to Death– A+

#4 in the Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne series. An excellent mystery, with lots of twists and turns. The initial case is not what it seems, and in the meantime, two other cases emerge. The whole novel takes place in one day. Cliffhanger at the end regarding Clare and Russ and their relationship.

June book-list

2005-07-31T22:00:00.000-07:00

Mary Higgins Clark, No Place Like Home, A-
A woman with a secret past returns to her hometown. I feel really old when I think about how many summers of my life have included the latest MHC!

Robert Barnard, The Graveyard Position, A-
A man returns home for his aunt’s funeral but some members of the family think he’s an impostor. Excellent British suspense. Actually part of the Detective Charlie Pease series, but we don’t see much of Charlie in this one.

Michael Connelly, The Closers, A+
I love this seres, and I’m a sucker for “cold case” books. Bosch returns to the force and teams up again with Kiz Ryder on a cold case squad. He outdoes himself with every book.

Martha Grimes, The Anodyne Necklace, A-
Another entertaining outing with Jury and Plant.

David Rosenfelt, Sudden Death, B+
Latest in the Andy Carpenter series. Andy and the crew take on the legal defense of a pro football player accused of murder. Good but not as good as the earlier ones.

Marttha Grimes, The Dirty Duck, A-
Jury and Plant take on another case. (These all sort of blur together for me - can’t quite remember which plot is which !)

Rett MacPherson, Thicker than Water, B+
Recent in the Torie O’Shea series - don’t read too many cozies, but these have a good sense of humor. Torie is facing a number of concerns in this book, including an extended visit from her mother-in-law.

Martha Grimes, Jerusalem Inn, A
The plots are beginning to get meatier. It’s always interesting to start a long-running series long after the fact and watch the entires get thicker and thicker.

CJ Box, Out of Range, A
When another forest ranger dies under mysterious circumstances, Joe is sent to Jackson to fill in. He finds himself involved in several cases while being out of his element in the tourist town. Excellent series with strong characters and settings.

Cara Black, Murder in the Marais, A-
Set in Paris in 1993, Aimee Leduc runs an investigative agency that deals with corporate security. When a friend of her deceased father asks her to take on a case, she ends up chasing Nazis from the past and present. Intriguing setting and characters.

Martha Grimes, Help the Poor Struggler, A-
More antics from Jury and Plant and the rest.

Martha Grimes, The Deer Leap, A
A more serious plot, involving a young gitl who may or may not be the heir to a fortune.

Monica Ferris, Embroidered Truths, B+
Another of the few cozy series I read, this one because of my interest in needlework. In this outing, Betsy must solve the case to save Goddy, who is looking like a prime suspect in a murder.

Martha Grimes, I Am the Only Running Footman, A-
Sense a pattern? :-)

Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Shadow of the Wind, A+
An excellent novel set in Spain during and after the Civil War. Has mystery elements, but I’d class it as fiction. A young boy finds a rare book and begins a decades-long quest to find out who the author really was. Filled with romance, intrigue, and humor, it is also one of the best coming of age stories I’ve read in a long while.

Cara Black, Murder in Belleville, A-
Second Aimee Leduc, this time a personal favor pulls her into a case involving immigrants and politiical corruption.

Martha Grimes, The Five Bells and the Bladebone, A-
Another enjoyable outing with the crew. Have to love Wiggins and his complete hypochondria.

May reading

2005-06-05T08:48:00.000-07:00

PJ Tracy, Dead Run
Wow. Oh wow. They've outdone themselves with this one. The suspense is cranked high on this one.

Stephen White, Cold Case
Had read a few of these back in 1997, now am catching up. Interesting plot and characters.

John Sandford, Broken Prey
I'll never get sick of Lucas Davenport. In this one, Lucas is off on the trail of a serial killer, but nothing is as it seems. Excellent scattering of red herrings keep the reader on his/her toes. This one also features a great subplot about the greatest 100 rock songs of all time - Lucas got an ipod and a gift certificate for 100 songs as a birthday present from Weather, and so he sets out to choose the best 100 songs, Beatles excluded. It's a stitch.

Stephen White, The Program
Dr. Alan Gregory takes on a patient who is in the witness protection program. Twisty plot.

PJ Parrish, A Killing Rain
Latest Louis Kincaid, pretty average, these used to be better.

Stephen White, Warning Signs
Another outing with the doc and the crew.

Nancy Geary, Regrets Only
Regrets that I bothered to finish this one. I nearly threw it back in the library bag several times but was a glutton for punishment and finished it.

Martha Grimes, The Man with a Load of Mischief
The first Richard Jury - somehow have never read any in this series. How is that possible? Very entertaining.

Martha Grimes, The Old Fox Deceiv'd
Jury and Plant return for more hijinks.

Harlan Coben, The Innocent
Another suspenseful standalone from him. A real nail-biter, this one.

Stephen White, The Best Revenge
Dr. Gregory is requiring a bit too much suspension of disbelief in this tale of revenge and retribution, although the layers of righteousness and irony are well done.

Earlene Fowler, Delectable Mountains
Latest Benni Harper. These are still enjoyable, but a bit too churchy/preachy for me.

Stephen White, Blinded
A former patient returns and drags Alan into another wild case.

Stephen White, Missing Persons
Alan gets involved in a case with shades of JonBenet all over it. After moaning for so many books about "that case," I was disappointed to find this one so closely tied to it.

Complete April list

2005-06-05T08:44:00.000-07:00

I guess A is for A's in April....mostly, anyway...

Robert Parker, Cold Service, A
Robert Crais, The Forgotten Man, A+
Elizabeth George, With No One as Witness, A+
Peter Robinson, Strange Affair, A
Jan Burke, Bloodlines, A+
Pam Lewis, Speak Softly, She Can Hear, C
Mary Jo Adamson, The Blazing Tree, B

April not the cruelest month

2005-06-05T07:56:00.000-07:00

April has not been the cruelest month in terms of reading. All stellar books.

First, before the trip to Minneapolis, I finished the latest Spenser novel, Cold Service. Robert Parker is in good form here. Hawk has been seriously injured, and Spenser helps him seek his revenge.

Then, finally I got my hands on the new Robert Crais, The Forgotten Man. His works get better and better all the time (although LA Requiem is still the masterpiece of the series). Elvis Cole gets a call in the middle of the night; a man killed in a skid row area has made a dying declaration that he is Elvis' father. Compelled to investigate, Elvis is drawn into something that is not what it appears and twice as sinister. As he has done in the last few novels, Crais offers up a few more details about Elvis' childhood and adolescence for us here.

Followed by the new Elizabeth George, With No One as Witness. Havers, still suffering her demotion, and Lynley team up to track down a serial killer; a copycat case has links to a pedophilia ring. Toward the end, something awful happens, no spoiler here, but the closing of the novel is tragic and heartbreaking.

Next up was the latest Peter Robinson, Strange Affair. After receiving an odd phone call from his brother, Banks heads to London. Meanwhile, a woman is pursued to Eastvale and killed. Banks'address is found on her body. The two cases pull together and Banks uncovers a heinous crime. Poignantly, he comes to know his brother well, although it's too late.

Let the feast continue - next in my bonanza of hold books from the library was Jan Burke's recent Irene Kelly, Bloodlines. This series gets better and better and better, and this one is beyond all expectations. The first segment is set in 1958, with extensive flashbacks to the 1930s. We meet Conn O'Connor, Irene's mentor, who, as you recall, was killed before the first book begins; solving his murder is Irene's first case. Two mysteries haunt O'Connor throughout his life: the murder of his sister in 1950 and a complicated case of murder, kidnapping and disappearances related to a prominent family that occurs in 1958. The middle segment takes place in 1978, when Irene is new to her career in journalism. She gains O'Connor's respect and helps him investigate the complex crime surrounding the Ducane family. The final segment takes place in 2000, and Irene is able to tie all the threads together, completely solving the Ducane case and finding the truth about Maureen's murder. There is so much more here, particularly in the first and third segments, which could have been a novel beyond the mystery elements. Burke has outdone herself.

March reading

2005-04-11T18:29:00.000-07:00

Linda Fairstein, Entombed, B+
I liked the mystery plot part of this one a lot, but the personal life stuff was too much in this one, and the ending was rushed and disjointed.

John Irving, A Widow for One Year, A
One of my all-time favorite authors. Hadn’t read this when it came out, not sure why/how I missed it. Had recently seen the movie "The Door in the Floor," which is an adaptation of part of the book, and got interested.

John Connolly, The White Road, A
Charlie Parker and his compatriots tackle another creepy case.

Elaine Viets, Murder Between the Covers, A
I enjoy this series, lots of humor without being slapstick, more cozy than not, but not cloyingly sweet. In this one, Helen has found a job at a bookstore and gets involved when the owner is murdered.

Ian Rankin, Fleshmarket Alley, A+
Most recent Rebus, excellent as always. And now begins the anxious wait for the next one!

Lee Harris, Murder in Alphabet City, A-
Second in the Jane Bauer/Cold Case Squad series. Jane is forced to reopen a cold case that probably wasn’t even a murder and ends up uncovering a whole other case.

Carrie Kapak, Cover the Butter, A-
Read this to review for Library Journal; book will be out in the summer. Good chick lit, set in Britain, most of it takes place in the 1960s-1980s as a flashback. Predictable happy ending, but hey, sometimes that’s what you need.

Ed McBain, Alice in Jeopardy, A-
A standalone thriller about a woman whose children have been kidnapped (for those who are squeamish about this kind of plot, there’s no gore or icky stuff here). Fast paced and a good read.

Mary Logue, Bone Harvest, A
Latest in the Claire Watkins series. One of the best in the series. A recent string of attacks seem to be connected to an unsolved case from the 1950s.

Jill McGown, Unlucky for Some, A+
Latest in the Lloyd/Hill series, excellent as always. The team races to find a serial killer who is corresponding with a journalist.

February Reads

2005-02-28T20:33:00.000-08:00

*Kate Atkinson, Case Histories
Janet LaPierre, Death Duties
*Jacqueline Winspear, Birds of a Feather
Gillian Roberts, Til the End of Tom
Jonathan Harrington, The Death of Cousin Rose
Jonathan Harrington, The Second Sorrowful Mystery
*Christine Poulson, Murder is Academic
Terence Faherty, The Lost Keats
*Sarah Smith, Chasing Shakespeares
Lisa Miscione, The Darkness Gathers
*Carl T. Smith, Lowcountry Boil
Elaine Viets, Shop till You Drop

Kate Atkinson, Case Histories

2005-02-05T20:57:00.000-08:00

I somehow had missed out on her until the fall 0f 2003 when I read her first book, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, which was brilliant (beginning at the moment of the narrator's conception). Her latest is brilliant as well. Case Histories begins with three chapters, told at various times in the past, which lay out three cases (two murders and one child disappearance). Jumping ahead to present day, we meet Jackson Brodie, a retired policeman, now a private detective who is dealing with a number of personal and professional issues. He ends up involved in looking into all three of the "cold cases" that are initially laid out. Atkinson's prose is stunning, and the stories are compelling. An excellent work.

January reading list

2005-02-05T20:54:00.000-08:00

excellent ones marked with an asterisk

*Dark Hollow, John Connolly
Skeleton Man, Tony Hillerman
The Lion’s Game, Nelson DeMille
*Night Fall, Nelson DeMille
Shoot the Moon, Billie Letts
The Ghost Writer, John Harwood
Hissy Fit, Mary Kay Andrews
*No Angel, Penny Vincenzi
*The Killing Kind, John Connolly
Murderers Prefer Blondes, Amanda Matetsky
Murder is a Girl’s Best Friend, Amanda Matetsky
*California Girl, T Jefferson Parker
Making It Up as I Go Along, M.T. Lennon
Sugar Skull, Denise Hamilton
*Grave Endings, Rochelle Krich
Secret Sanction, Brian Haig
*Something Dangerous, Penny Vincenzi
*Into Temptation, Penny Vincenzi

Penny Vincenzi: No Angel, Something Dangerous, Into Temptation (aka The Spoils of Time trilogy)

2005-02-05T20:51:00.000-08:00

Ran across a blurb about her about Booksense. My public library had No Angel, which I just devoured. It’s a very well done big thick soap opera/family saga novel, beginning in 1904, with Lady Celia Beckenham getting married to Oliver Lytton, son and heir apparent of the Lytton publishing house. The first novel takes us through World War I, and I just couldn’t put it down. The characters are fascinating. Unfortunately, the second and third are much harder to find here in the US. Paperback editions are currently UK only. I ended up ordering paperbacks from a shop in Bath for less than I could procure US hardbacks. Something Dangerous picks up in 1928 and takes us through World War II, leaving off at 1946. It has all kinds of familial and business intrigue, love affairs, and of course the war. One of Celia’s daughters has to escape from Paris when the Nazis come, along with other tragedies. Into Temptation begins at the time of the Coronation, and many changes have taken place in terms of deaths and such. Reading the “cast of characters” page at the beginning had my jaw dropping several times. Vincenzi has quite a few novels to her credit, although none of the others seem to be trilogies or have recurring characters. Not usually the sort of thing I go for, but they are well written, with strong characters, historical contexts, an interesting overview of the history of book publishing through the 20th century, and plot twists galore.

Nelson DeMille, Night Fall

2005-01-05T20:38:00.000-08:00

I read his Plum Island awhile back and really liked it. Hadn't gotten around to the second one and then heard about this one. I got both from the library and also recently read The Lion's Game, the second to feature John Corey, who is now a former NYPD homicide detective working for the FBI. Lion's Game was published and is set in 2000 and is about a chase for a Libyan terrorist whose family was killed in the 1980s when the US bombed Qadafi's camps and has grown up seeking revenge.

Warning: can't really talk about Night Fall without spoilers.

The new one, Night Fall, begins in July 2001 and wraps up on September 12, 2001. It deals with Corey and his new wife Kate, an FBI agent he met in the previous book, unofficially reopening the TWA 800 case. Corey is successful in proving that TWA 800 was shot down by a missile, and
he learns that the officials in charge would have also known (conspiracy theorist's dream plot here). He schedules a showdown meeting in the Windows of the World at 8:30am on September 11. He runs late, and luckily Kate waits for him in the lobby, but a whole host of FBI & CIA agents and NYPD officers, along with the two civilians and their videotape, the ones who could prove what all those eyewitnesses saw that terrible night, perish.

Can't wait to see what he comes up with next!

Year End Tally

2004-12-31T20:44:00.000-08:00

This year I read 191 books. 169 of those were mysteries, 20 were regular fiction, and 2 were non-fiction. Guess my preferences are clear….particularly since one of the two non-fiction works was a mystery of sorts (the book about the death of Poe, see below). Here’s to another great reading year.

December reads

2004-12-31T20:40:00.000-08:00

The “A” books are marked with an *; the others would be “B’s.”

*Dana Stabenow, A Taint in the Blood

*Deborah Crombie, In a Dark House

*Reginald Hill, Good Morning, Midnight

Monica Ferris, Crewel Yule

Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason, The Rule of Four

*Anita Shreve, Light on Snow

Amy Tan, The Book of Fates (essays)

*Barbara Hambly, A Free Man of Color

*John E. Walsh, Midnight Dreary: The Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe

Barbara Hambly, Fever Season

David Handler, Bright Silver Star

*John Connolly, Every Dead Thing

John Connolly, Every Dead Thing

2004-12-31T20:39:00.000-08:00

Have to add this to the 2004 “best” list. Wow. Connolly is Irish, but his protagonist is an American named Charlie Parker. Although his parents weren’t jazz fans, he has always been called Bird. With that silliness aside, Connolly then gets down to business. Bird was a NYPD homicide detective until his wife and child were brutally murdered. Obsessed with finding the killer, he roams around for a bit, and comes back to NY only to get involved in a case as an unofficial investigator. He tracks down the guilty parties in that case, which also deals with the murder of children, and it leads him into a new line on the serial killer who took his family. The second half of the book deals with tracking down the killer, who is one of the creepiest serial killers I’ve seen in print. Very well written, with excellent character development.

Midnight Dreary: The Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe

2004-12-31T20:38:00.000-08:00

A fascinating look at the last months of Poe’s life. John Evangelist Walsh has done an excellent literary and historical investigation and has produced a theory about Poe’s tragic end that makes entire sense to me. A real page turner, this was much more intriguing that most literary scholarship!

Barbara Hambly, A Free Man of Color

2004-12-31T20:24:00.000-08:00

For some reason, I finally decided to give this series a try. Set in New Orleans in 1833, the main character is Benjamin January, a free man of color who is a musician but also trained as a doctor in Paris. He has returned home to New Orleans after many years in Paris; his Moroccan wife died and he felt the need to get away from all the things that reminded him of her. The New Orleans he returns to is much different. Hambly provides a lot of really interesting detail about the society of this era, particularly in NO, and the changes that were leading up to the Civil War.

Looking back on 2004

2004-12-15T23:11:00.000-08:00

One of my online book groups has already done the "best of 2004" lists. Some of them have also posted their "worst of" lists, what a tough crowd.
Here is my list of "wow" books from 2004 (ones I read in 2004, not all
were published in 2004):

Laura Lippman, Every Secret Thing
PD James, The Murder Room
Margaret Maron, Last Lessons of Summer
Diane Leslie, Fleur de Leigh's Life of Crime
Robert Barnard, A Cry in the Dark
Reginald Hill, On Beulah Height
Lisa Scottoline, Killer Smile
Minette Walters, Disordered Minds
Karin Slaughter, Indelible
Judith Guest, The Tarnished Eye

These last 6 are, I guess my "double wow" books:
Jincy Willett, Winner of the National Book Award
Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler's Wife
Michael Connelly, The Narrows
Jacqueline Winspear, Maisie Dobbs
KJ Erickson, Alone at Night
SJ Rozan, Absent Friends

And I got back into and got caught up on two excellent series: Ian
Rankin's John Rebus series and Lee Child's Jack Reacher series.

All in all, a pretty good reading year. And there's always the possibility of some more goodies before the month ends.

Anita Shreve, Light on Snow

2004-12-15T21:13:00.000-08:00

I could not put this book down. I started it and was on page 72 before I knew it. Nicky, our narrator, recalls the events of one December, around 1983, when she was 12 years old. She and her father lived in New Hampshire then, having fled New York after the car accident that took the lives of her mother and baby sister Clara. Living a quiet life in a desolate area, her father makes furniture and Nicky tries to adjust to their new life. One day, while taking a walk through the woods, they find an abandoned infant. A short time after, the mother of the abandoned baby, posing as someone who wants to buy a piece of furniture, comes to meet them, and after admitting her true identity, ends up trapped in their house for a few days during a snowstorm.

Shreve has some wonderful lines in this one. In one scene, Nicky sees that her father has brought out a photo of Clara, and Nicky reminisces about other photos that are not displayed, reminders of happier days and mundane events. In one, she notes, you could hear her father snoring (174). At another point, Nicky notes that her father has bought the supplies her grandmother will need to prepare the Christmas meal. Grammie, Nicky tells us, always "hits the ground cooking" (286).

The book veered toward melodrama at the end, not finishing as strongly as it might have, but it still was quite emotionally powerful. An excellent read.

Reginald Hill, Good Morning, Midnight

2004-12-06T06:42:00.000-08:00

What a relief. After the ponderous Dialogues of the Dead, and the literally unreadable Death's Jest-Book - and I'm one who appreciated Arms and the Women, even as the successor to the masterpiece On Beulah Height - I find Hill is back in form with Good Morning, Midnight.

Pascoe is called to the scene of what appears to be a suicide...it's just that the man's father committed suicide ten years earlier, in the same place, in the same manner, with the same items left behind. Pascoe, Wield and Novello are thrown into a tricky investigation where there are many people, including one rather close to home, with things to hide.

Deborah Crombie, In a Dark House

2004-12-05T10:18:00.000-08:00

The most recent in the Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James series, one of my favorites. This one has a very complex plot, with several cases that may or may not be connected swirling around, including arson, murder, kidnapping and a battered women's shelter, an MP who's hiding something, an arsonist. There are few moments where the descriptive narrative is a bit strained but overall, definitely another strong entry in this series.

Dana Stabenow, A Taint in the Blood

2004-12-05T10:14:00.000-08:00

The latest in the Kate Shugak series - Kate is hired by a woman who wants Kate to prove her mother is innocent of murder. The catch: the mother has been in prison for 30 years, having been convicted of the crime. Kate goes to Anchorage to investigate the case. Although Kate isn't sure she's getting anywhere, someone is noticing her progress and clearly doesn't want the case re-examined. Another good entry in this series, and for those keeping track of Kate's lovelife, we see an awful lot of Jim Chopin in this one.

November Reads

2004-11-29T20:57:00.000-08:00

Where has the month gone? Not as many as usual. Lots of travel and being busy at work affected my reading time. Excellent books marked with asterisk.

Andrew Taylor, Blood Relation (William Dougal series)
*SJ Rozan, Absent Friends (see blog entry below)
Robert B Parker, Melancholy Baby (Sunny Randall series)
*Erin Hart, Haunted Ground (see blog entry below)
*Erin Hart, Lake of Sorrows (see blog entry below)
*Andrew Taylor, The Sleeping Policeman (William Dougal series)
Nora Roberts, Northern Lights (see blog entry below)
Carolyn G Hart, Letter from Home
*Andrew Taylor, An Air That Kills (DI Thornhill series)
Andrew Taylor, The Mortal Sickness (DI Thornhill series)
Maeve Binchy, Night of Rain and Stars
Andrew Taylor, The Lover of the Grave (DI Thornhill series)
Sharon Duncan, The Lavender Butterfly Murders (Scotia MacKinnon series)
James Swain, Sucker Bet (Tony Valentine series)

Catching up: October reads

2004-11-13T12:28:00.000-08:00

Just for the record, my list of books read in October...excellent ones marked with an asterisk:

Keith Ablow, Murder Suicide (Dr Frank Clevenger series)
Deborah Adams, All the Hungry Mothers (Jesus Creek series)
Pamela Thomas-Graham, Orange Crushed (Nikki Chase series)
Dicey Deere, The Irish Village Murder (Torrey Tunet series)
*Sujata Massey, The Pearl Diver (Rei Shimura series)
David Rosenfelt, Bury the Lead (Andy Carpenter series)
Janet LaPierre, Old Enemies (Port Silva series)
Janet LaPierre, Baby Mine (Port Silva series)
Janet LaPierre, Keepers (Port Silva series)
*Laura Lippman, By a Spider's Thread (Tess Monaghan series)
Andrew Taylor, Waiting for the End of the World (William Dougal series)
*Sarah Stewart Taylor, Mansions of the Dead (Sweeney St. George series)
Deborah Adams, All the Deadly Beloved (Jesus Creek series)
Deborah Adams, All the Blood Relations (Jesus Creek series)
*Andrew Taylor, Our Father's Lies (William Dougal series)
*Andrew Taylor, An Old School Tie (William Dougal series)
*Tess Gerritsen, Body Double (Rizzoli/Isles series)
*Kate Wilhelm, The Unbidden Truth (Barbara Holloway series)
*Andrew Taylor, Freelance Dance (William Dougal series)

Catching up: September reads

2004-11-13T12:25:00.000-08:00

And my September ones...excellent ones marked with an asterisk:

Perri O'Shaughnessy, Presumption of Death (Nina Reilly series)
Perri O'Shaughnessy, Unlucky in Law (Nina Reilly series)
*Margaret Maron, High Country Fall (Deborah Knott series)
James Grippando, Hear No Evil (Jack Swyteck series)
Alex Kava, One False Move
*JA Jance, Hour of the Hunter
*Jincy Willett, Winner of the National Book Award
JA Jance, Kiss of the Bees (sequel to Hour of the Hunter)
Deborah Adams, All the Great Pretenders (Jesus Creek series)
Deborah Adams, All the Crazy Winters (Jesus Creek series)
Deborah Adams, All the Dark Diguises (Jesus Creek series)
*Judith Guest, The Tarnished Eye
Janet LaPierre, Children's Games (Port Silva series)
Janet LaPierre, Cruel Mother (Port Silva series)
Janet LaPierre, Gradmother's House (Port Silva series)
*KJ Erickson, Alone at Night (Mars Bahr series)
*Steve Hamilton, Ice Run (Alex McKnight series)
*Adrian Tomine, Summer Blonde
Joanne Harris, Jigs and Reels (short stories)
Susan Wittig Albert, An Unthymely Death (China Bayles short stories)
GH Ephron, Obsessed (Dr Peter Zak series)

Nora Roberts, Northern Lights

2004-11-12T21:56:00.000-08:00

As I don't care for romance novels, I don't usually seek out Nora Roberts. I tried the "In Death" series she writes as JD Robb and found it kind of silly, but last year sometime I had heard lots of good things about her book Birthright, which was being talked about as if it were a mystery, probably classed as "romantic suspense" but more of a mystery plot with some sex scenes than the In Death books, which seemed to me to be sex scenes with some plot....Anyway, Northern Lights is one of her newest ones, also in this romantic suspense/mystery category.

This one takes place in a little town called Lunacy, Alaska, where a Baltimore police detective named Nate has fled, escaping his failed marriage and problems on the job after his partner was killed. A man who was thought to have taken off voluntarily is found dead; he has been frozen solid in a cave rather than off avoiding his family for the last 16 years. When someone commits suicide and leaves a note claiming responsibility for the old murder, Nate is one of the few people who doesn't buy it. He of course solves the case, wins the girl, and all that. But it was an enjoyable read, with lots of quirky characters and snappy dialogue, and yes - it is a Nora Roberts, after all - some steamy sex scenes.

Absent Friends, SJ Rozan

2004-11-12T13:47:00.000-08:00

When Dennis Lehane abandoned Patrick and Angie to publish a standalone, many people despaired, but then quickly forgave him for straying from the series after reading Mystic River. Same thing here with Rozan. At first, I was disappointed when I learned the new book wasn't a new entry in the Bill & Lydia series. What a fool I was to feel that way.

Absent Friends is one of the best books I've read in a long time. There is a mystery element, actually a couple of them, and the story unfolds via a series of flashbacks. The characters are richly developed. The plot is complex, and I could go into detail about what's it about, but what it's really about is how we navigate love and loss, face or shirk responsibility, and how we define or misunderstand what it means to be a hero.

In addition to all that, the portrayal of life in the aftermath of 9-11 was riveting and heartbreaking. The epilogue, which is related to the theme of the book, although not related to the plot in a concrete way, was stunning.

When I finished the book, I put it down, mostly because I needed to get a kleenex to wipe away the tears, but I couldn't bear to be apart from it. I literally held the book to my chest and cried awhile, for all the absent friends in all our lives.

Erin Hart, Haunted Ground and Lake of Sorrows

2004-11-12T13:00:00.000-08:00

I had Haunted Ground checked out from the library last fall, but couldn't get into it for some reason. Had no trouble this time. And was really glad to have the follow-up - hopefully just book #2 in a new long-running series - sitting there ready to dive into.

Haunted Ground combines a present day mystery with a historical one. I was fascinated with the research done to identify the dead woman in the bog, and what a sad tale. Lake of Sorrows also uses this combination timeline approach, although in this case the historical case is only a few decades old, rather than centuries removed.

Good characters, interesting settings in Ireland, and an interesting blend of forensic, archaeological, and historical mystery.

Here we go....

2004-11-12T12:26:00.000-08:00

Have been meaning to do this for quite some time, and now finally have jumped in to the blogosphere. A day off from work, the perfect time to start a new project instead of finishing up some others!

Why am I here? I keep a written journal of all the books I read and then end up typing it all up to share with online friends. It would be much easier to just do it online in the first place.

So, we're off.