Here we go...

Please post below the title of book you have read for our mystery month of October. Also include author, rating, and a short review (just a few sentences).

Each reviews below gives you an entry for the draw for December shelf picking :)

Size 12 is Not Fat by Meg Cabot

The first 299 pages of this book were pretty ordinary. The writing wasn't that great and I thought the story line was pretty lame. Being familiar with Tiffany and Debbie Gibson, I could relate to Ms. Wells past life, but after a while all the pop star references were getting pretty old. Toward the end of the book it got interesting. One thing I have to say is that I did not figure out who the killer was, and the action really picked up, at that point I had to finish. I did like the 'resolution' as well. This is why I upped my original grade of 2 stars which I was fully planning to give it, to three stars. The ending saved the book.

The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith

I was bored by the first 100 pages or so of this book. I just couldn't get into it. But, after the action picked up, I couldn't put it down. It got so intense that I read it through two classes. It was really good, and what could have been a really cheesy ending, wasn't. So for that, I gave it 4 stars.

Ooh, glad to hear good things about Ripley. As I said in a previous forum, I wasn't crazy about the movie but felt it had a lot of potential so I might try the book.

The Body in the Library by Agatha Christie

The Body in the Library tells the story of a mysterious body of a murdered young woman found in an old couple's library. It features the adorable Miss Marple, an old village lady whose understanding of human nature proved her much sharper than people expected her to be. Interestingly, though it is a Miss Marple mystery, much of the book does not feature her until at good halfway into the story, assisting the police's investigation in her own distinct grandmotherly way.

I guess it's a feeling you can't help but to notice after reading several (or in my case, nearly all) of Agatha Christie's books that they are very similar. Indeed, Agatha Christie's books are very dependable. They are mostly simple, easy, and very formulaic. However, no matter how many of her books you've read, still they manage to intrigue and tickle your curiosity, enveloping you in a charming post-Victorian English mannerism.

So if you're looking for good, easy mystery reads, you can never go wrong with an Agatha Christie book.

Three star simply for being another delightful Agatha Christie book.

The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie

The Murder at the Vicarage is the first Agatha Christie where we're introduced to the frail, gentle elderly spinster, Miss Jane Marple. Different from most other Christie books written using third person POV, this one utilises a first person POV from the Vicar's perspective, which helps introduce us better to the characters in St Mary's Mead, in particular Miss Marple.

The story itself is pretty common, but doesn't make it any less interesting. A Colonel was found murdered in the vicarage study and it seems that almost everyone has a motive to kill him. The plot may not be the best thing of the story, but Miss Marple's sharp observation of human nature more than made up for it.

Another three star for being an Agatha Christie book, though if we had halves, I'd give it an extra half because of the different pov from the usual Christie books.

Mark Of Murder, by Dell Shannon--Seth's review.

Elizabeth Linington--under the pseudonym Dell Shannon--wrote many mystery novels starring her fictional creation Lt. Luis Mendoza. He's a handsome, hot-blooded, somewhat hot-headed cop, with a talent for hunches. Which is not to say that the reader is not given at least some clues, before the epiphany strikes our hero.

In this one, we get two mysteries for the price of a single book, both steeped in lots of detail even just in the first 50 pages (while Mendoza is off in Bermuda, with his wife, on vacation!), with more startling developments adding to the complexities of each cases.

The cases? A serial killer is on a knifing spree in LA, at night. The book starts with a fourth body being found, which means lots of witnesses and locations for Mendoza's colleagues--including big Sgt. Hackett to follow up on. But Hackett gets distracted by the slaying of a chiropractor, in his own office, courtesy of a bullet. This murder takes about ten pages to obviously become more complicated than the simple burglary-gone-wrong it resembles on the surface. This chiropractor, it turns out, is at the centre of an ever-expanding web of strangness (where do you want to start? the wife? the nurse? the appointment book? the disappearing sterilizer? the clue clutched in the dead man's hand?).

Anyway, vacation over for Mendoza, when his pal Hackett ends up in a coma after a suspicious car accident, after mentioning to a few people here and there that, overworked as he was through the day, he was going to be following up on a few lines of inquiry regarding BOTH cases? So really, we have a third mystery landing on top of the other two: if someone tried to off Hackett, was it because of his snooping around after the Slasher on the loose, or did he get too close to the chiropractor killer? This is part of the fun of the book--Mendoza trying to discover what Hackett discovered (tough if you gotta wonder who's even lying about seeing him that night). Plus, Hackett's tragedy makes the book a bit more personal for all the cops run ragged on these cases, especially Mendoza, which means the reader, too, is hoping it all gets solved and justice is divvied up.

This is a short novel, with tons of stuff going on. The author doesn't waste a page. Dialogue is clipped, characters are fleshed out at a whirl, and subplots--such as Mendoza thinking about quitting, after seeing what's happened to Hackett--are dealt with briskly...perhaps to the detriment of the novel really achieving something truly special. The fact is, a mystery like this, as it begins to see its layers of complexity, its red herrings and false scenarios, gradually peeled away to reveal what is actually the truth, stands or falls on how clever the original premise is, as well as how clever the real clues are. Riveting as this little rocket of a novel is most of the way along, I confess to getting my own hunch about who the chiropractor killer was, and why the murder was committed. As far as our knife-wielding pattern-killer plotline goes, this turns into more of a chase scenario--albeit an exciting one, and one that comes after much dogged policework coupled with some shrewd psychological insights--than any kind of puzzle for the ages. No, the dead chiropractor plot is the one with the real whodunit angle, and I don't think Dell Shannon matches some of her other efforts, such as in Root Of All Evil, or Ace Of Spades.

All in all, though, the pace and the complexity--as well as a fairly satisfactory climax--might make this a good choice for anyone wanting to meet a somewhat neglected detective of yesteryear, Lt. Mendoza.

smashing review, Seth

Swell. Tried to stay away from spoilers. Not likely too many people will chase after this out-of-print author anyway. But the books are around...they're around.

Listen, for October, I'm reading alternating Crime and Horror novels. I guess I'm allowed to come here and post reviews of the Crime choices throughout the month?

As long as the book falls within the mystery shelf, please do :)

Passenger to Frankfurt by Agatha Christie

I love Agatha Christie books, but this is probably one book of hers that I couldn't get into and cannot like, ever. It's a political spy/mystery thriller, I suppose, but even after three quarters of the book I still couldn't clearly grasp what the real issue is. The characters are very stale, and the dialogues long and winding. I've tried to plough through to the end, but it doesn't get any better. Not a good one, Miss Christie! One star.

Curse of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz

This book is a sequel to The Spellman Files, which I read in August, after I had my son. The Files was a great book to read -- it was fun and interesting. While I was a little disappointed in how it ended, I realize that's just how life is. Now, onto The Curse . . . I absolutely loved this one! You've already gotten to know the characters, a quirky family who runs a private investigating business in San Francisco. It's easier to follow the zany adventures of Isabel Spellman, who just can't seem to keep herself out of trouble. I read this in just a few short days, and am kind of sad that it was over. The only thing about these books that gets me, which I find fun but also distracting -- the narrator uses a lot of footnotes (they're not always overly informational) and sometimes I just hate to break away from the actual story to read this. I gave this five stars as it was a great break from the other books that I've been read. Well done, Lisa Lutz!

What the Dead Knows by Laura Lippman

The story revolves around the disappearance of two sisters from a Baltimore mall. Their bodies are never found and no clues emerge even after one detective works on the case for years. Then a woman turns up claiming to be the younger of the two sisters and it is now thirty years later. But the woman refuses to give many details. She plays a game with the detectives. The chapters switch between past and present timelines. I found this book to be very engrossing and I was honestly suprised at the ending. Perhaps it is because I haven't read a mystery for so long but I failed to see some of the clues. I gave this book a four star rating since it held my attention so well and I was very satisfied at the ending.

The Devil You Know by Mike Carey



Here's what I posted in the book review field on the site...

Genre: Supernatural Mystery
Audience: Adult
Setting: London
Notes: First in a series

Review:
Felix Castor, known as Fix to his friends, is an exorcist in and alternate modern day London. He is hired to remove a ghosts in an archive, but in the course of this relatively simple job he uncovers a mystery.

Each character is fully developed and intriguing, but often seem disconnected from the other characters. It isn't until near the very end that it comes clear that two or three plot lines are actually tied together. Fix feels that they are connected somehow from early on but readers are as clueless to the connections as he is until the mystery is solved.

* * * * *

Here's what I didn't put in the review:

I liked this book, especially the characters and the setting. Castor creates a world that's new, but not too extreme. He explains why there are ghosts and zombies and such, but doesn't make anything seem too fantastic to be 'real'. I think this is a good book for people who are leary of trying a 'paranormal' book, but enjoy dark mysteries. I'm a fan of Patricia Cornwell, John Sandford and the like. This is a dark world, there's a light touch of sex and a relatively good mystery.

What I didn't like about it was my own ignorance of London and British-English. There were a lot of terms that caught me off guard (Restaurant order: "A pint of heavy and a packet of crisps." is one example) and the decriptions of Fix's travels were all foreign to me. He talked about Kings Cross and the tube stations as though I should know which neighborhoods were good and which were bad. If the neighborhood was really bad he did a good job discribing it, but most of the locals were glossed over after a couple sentances. Likely Brits reading about LA might have the same issues.

Light Bread by Cordell Adams

I met Cordell Adams at a book signing/reading last week. He's such a nice guy. I had a great time chatting with him and his friend... (I'm kicking myself for not remembering the woman's name. She was a pleasure to chat with.)... They had me laughing so hard: I worried about wetting myself. They get into an old Southern Black Lady routine complete with props and church lady hats that had eveyone just having a good ol' time. The book is just as much fun Adam's signing was.

Adam's book is about Mama, his grandmother. {Southern grandmothers go by what the rest of y'all might think of as unusual forms of endearment. I called mine by her first name.} The story is set in the late 1960s. Veola Cook is a housekeeper, a devout church lady, and the nosiest woman in Parkerville, Texas. She accomplishes whatever she decides needs to be done with the gift of gab, a cast-iron skillet, and a worn-out Bible. She's on a God-given mission to improve her community and Heaven help any one that doesn't think they need Veola's "improvemnets". She's not a bully or even really pushy... Ok maybe she is just a tiny dab pushy, but in a fun way, as she makes her patch of the world a pleasant place to be. Veola's newest mission is to catch the man who tried to break into her house.

This book talks a bit about racial issuse in the South in the 60s, kids on drugs,dead-beat dads and problems both black and white kids have to deal with while growing up. It is not all fun and games-- but Viola's good sense and abundant humor shine through even the un-funny parts of the story.

I won't add a spoiler, but I'll admit to enjoying the books' happy ending.

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency Book 1 by Alexander McCall Smith

Although I read lots of mystery books I had previously avoided this one due to all the hype however it was the first one on the top shelf page that I hadn't read and had easy access to a copy of.

I have a full review on the book's page but here's an extract

I'm not quite sure how a white, male Scottish law lecturer speaks so authoritatively in the voice of a black woman from Botswana but it certainly feels authentic. Everything from the design of the cover to the language of the opening passages transported me immediately to Africa and that sense of place was never lost. My favourite thing about the story is that it is full of good, hardworking, fun-loving people because it's not a picture often painted about Africa...It would be easy to dismiss this book as a light read but it does tackle important issues such as domestic violence, poverty, loneliness and the differences between what is legal and what is moral or just. It just does it gently rather than with copious amounts of blood and gore. While I like those books too I found this one an unexpectedly delightful read: one of those books I feel grateful to have found.

LOL Lanica...you'd think with us all speaking the same language we'd never have these translation issues but I have them all the time too (we use more British terms than American ones in our version of English here in Australia). In case no one has yet translated that sentence for you...A pint is the largest glass of beer you can order at a pub or bar, heavy is a generic style of beer on tap (i.e. not a brand) and crisps are what we call potato chips

Plum Lovin' by Janet Evanovich

This was a fun, quick read. I can't give it a rave review but it was fine for a beach read.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay : 5 stars

WOW... i have a new favourite book and author! think i may have found my niche :)

is very easy to read and thoroughly engaging. i've already watched the first season of Dexter on tv, so was familiar with the characters and storyline, but was an awesome read none the less. i couldn't wait to see what was going to happen next.

DDD is a mystery read, but also a psychological thriller which makes it so compelling. BRILLIANTLY written original content, with such a sharp dry wit giving it a great sense of humour.

the fact that the main character/serial killer has an honourable code of conduct is something that makes him somewhat a hero and very endearing.

never would i have imagined being so enthralled with such a topic, but that is the magic of Jeff Lindsay!! looking forward to reading the next two books in the Dexter series.

Bones to Ashes by Kathy Reichs (3 stars)

It was overall an easy read and quite intriguing. The main character, Temperance Brennan, is a forencis anthropologist and there are many many scientific references throughout the book. As I'm mainly not a science person, most of these details just sort of go over my head so whilst I appreciate the spin, I didn't really think it's necessary to go to that depth.

The book begins with a nostalgic rememberance of her childhood friend who suddenly left and would not reply to her letters. Certain circumstances triggered her to search for this missing friend whilst still working her cases. The end just seems a little bit convenient.

What I really like from this book in the series is her relationship with her sister, Harry. Which I don't think was prominent in the other books. Or at least Harry was merely passing by in the other books but here she's featured quite a bit. It made a welcome change.

I also did Size 12 Is Not Fat by Meg Cabot.

This is what I wrote for my review (3 stars):
I thought this book started off ridiculously boring. Not to mention the author clearly loved her em dashes and used them in just about every second sentence. I love my side thoughts as much as the next person, but to be interrupted that many times as she trails off on yet another tangent? Offputting.

Eventually, the book settles and the em dashes disappear. Right around the time of the first murder. Which is when the book really picks up, actually becoming really fast paced and humourous and witty. There are some seriously laugh-out-loud moments that just had me rolling on the floor, and I think they make up for the slow pace and overused em dashes in the first 100 pages or so.

I'm also not that much a fan of the whodunnit, but this one completely caught me by surprise and I really enjoyed the mystery aspect. Over all, really entertaining.

The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz (5 stars)

FYI-this book is the first in a series. Book 2 is reviewed in Message 12 of this thread! I let my sister borrow this book from me before I read it, so she's made it to #2 in the series before me.


This book is the first in a new series about a family of PIs. It's told from the perspective of Izzy Spellman, an (almost) 30 year old who's been working for her parents since she was 12 years old. She's a bit of a "loose cannon", who tries to be "normal" in a family that is unabashadely abnormal.

Here is my review:

Yeah! I'm so glad I read this one. It came at a perfect time for me--I just read House of Leaves, and needed something humorous and action packed. I laughed out loud at least a dozen times with this one.

Lutz has really committed to her characters. Though the Spellmans are not deep characters, they are well designed. Each fills their own role, and the dialogue is both hilarious and realistic for those characters. I was able to appreciate and "love" them all.

Lots of truths to this book, too. The whole idea that it's better to be a guy on a stake out cause you can pee in a bottle--yeah, my DH shared that with me, too--how glamorous.

Not sure where Lutz got her inspiration, but the actions and interactions of her family of PIs seems accurate, funny, and endearing.

I look forward to more in this series. It's a lighthearted "mystery" series that will keep you turning the pages, if only to see what this funny family does next

I read the The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willig
and I gave it three stars. Here is my review:

Eloise Kelly is a modern day scholar investigating the romantic spies in France in the 1800s. Through a lucky break she obtains access to some diaries which slowly unravel the mystery of the Pink Carnation, one of the most mysterious secret agents of the time.

The story jumps between the present and the challenges in Eloise's life as she is reading the diary, and historical France. One of the issues I had was that while parts about Eloise were written in the first person, when jumping back in time it wasn't done in a diary format but was written in the third person. However, this was probably excusable as it did deal with different characters.
The mystery slowly developed and although I did think I had it pegged at the start I wasn't actually right. That said, the ending did fit well with the rest of the story.

The characters were all strong and interesting and easy to like and the story flowed well, building up intrigue and excitement as it went.

This may be a bit chic-lit for some mystery readers but overall I enjoyed it.

Lindsay, sounds intriguing - I'm going to have a read for myself! Thanks! :)

The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith

It is quite a feat how a Scottish professor could capture the feel of Africa to make you forget that the writer isn't African himself, but that's what Alexander McCall Smith did with The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency.

My initial expectation of this book is to go into some sort of Miss Marple-ish mystery, but I was proven wrong. Ladies' Detective Agency does have a little bit of sleuthing, but it's not what drives it. It is a collection of loosely-tied light detective work and backstories that builds the life of Precious Ramotswe, Botswana's only lady detective! It actually deals more with human nature and culture, some very definitely African on the surface but have very universal parallels to people everywhere. For that, I think this book will appeal more to general readers than mystery fans looking for a thrilling detective story - two stars!

The Wounded And The Slain, by David Goodis--my review:

I've recently been reading some books about the Caribbean, whether they be fiction, or in the case of one history book, non-fiction. It started with a short-story collection called Trinidad Noir, which gave me some authors to follow up on, whenever their little bios indicated actual novels written and published. But then I was at the bookstore, which had set up whole shelf of nothing but the "Hard Case Crime" series as part of their huge Crime And Mystery section...and the first book I picked up to read the back cover for info was set in Kingston, Jamaica. So that seemed appropriate; it was also tempting to finally read a David Goodis book--a fairly major hardboiled crime writer I had not as yet sampled--and here was a "longlost" novel by him now back in print.

It's pretty good. It's kind of a psychological thriller, as a man who has given up on life in general goes wandering into the slums of Kingston late at night to meet his destiny. A vicious attack results, as well as some drama concerning who the police think did what, versus what actually happened...and all this is balanced with our "hero"--James Bevan's--crumbling domestic situation; he's on vacation in Kingston with his wife, who doesn't want anything physical from him, and this has wreaked havoc with the marriage, and driven Bevan to drink, and thoughts of suicide. He's on the edge, right when we enter the novel.

The character of the wife--Cora Bevan--seems like an aspect of the book that may emerge as a weakness. We basically see her through her put-upon husband's eyes at first, and it feels as though she is not going to be fully fleshed out, and possibly left as the "spouse from hell", the cause of most of why we pity Bevan himself. When Bevan treks out for his harrowing adventure and we see her hanging around the pool with her eye on another man--a better man in every way--it looks like we Cora may only be there as the catalyst for James's woes, and as expected, the narrative follows him, not her.

But then, Cora is reluctantly yanked into the crime elements of the story, and it is interesting to see what the real husband/wife dynamic is like here, once James is in big trouble. She becomes part of a tricky scenario that would get Bevan out of Kingston, instead of dead or in jail, if that's possible. And the odds are definitely against him.

I would have liked to give this lively book a 4 star rating out of 5, but I think that this is one of those books that is quite compelling while it is being read, but ultimately does not leave an indelible impression, the way a great crime novel really would. It's an easy read, with some plot twists that put the lead character in an intriguing predicament, one that tests his underlying moral fibre, assuming it was not lost ages ago. As for the Caribbean details--well, I've never been to Jamaica, so I'm hardly an expert. But having read a few pertinent novels (and one history book) before this, it seems that the author does not embarrass himself with the depictions of the natives, or with the little details, like references to the sugar trade.

I read SAY GOODBYE by Lisa Gardner. It was very good, and remminded me why my husband and I are such freaks about letting our boys out of our sites. This book is in a series, but you don't have to read them in order. It was a quick read and I would recommend it!

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
2.5 stars

This book is a spin off of Bram Stoker's Dracula set in a new era with new spins to the vampire lores. It begins with a young girl who found a strange book along with an even stranger letter which prompted her to ask her father for the story behind these items. The stories told spans 3 generations (her grandparents, her parents, and her own).

The book is written almost in the same format as Dracula; that is in the form of letters & journal entries. However it has some narratives also.

The first half of the book was very hard to get into. The way it was written was almost like a formula; a chapter is made up of 1-1.5 pages of narrative then 5-10 pages of journal entry then 0.5-1 page of narrative. It was very hard to follow as the focus shifted to often and I feel that everytime the story was getting good, the focus shifted and I lost a bit of my interest along the way.

In saying the above, it was much improved in the second half of the book. It doesn't follow the above formula anymore and I could actually get into the stories (past & present) and was able to enjoy it. But it was a tough first 500 pages.

Curse of the Spellmans: A Novel by Lisa Lutz--5 stars

Second in the series. Once I finished the first one I ran (okay, not ran. Drove. It's not that close) to the library and picked up the sequel.

Melissa already gave a review of this one, too. I enjoyed it, and would recommend this one for all those who like to laugh out loud and love clever dialogue in their books.

Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie--3 stars

This was an audiobook, and I was not a fan. The first Hercule Poirot book I've "read". The audio was in radio format (where, instead of a reader, the dialogue and setting was acted out audially). I didn't like that format.

However, I thought it was a good story. I'll be reading my next Poirot.

One for the Money by Janet Evanovich : 3 stars.

so i just finished reading and i'm not sure what to say. my first impression was "amusing". my first thought upon completion was "cute".

i did tend to get bored at times, but just as i did something exciting would usually happen, so was a very up and down ride.

i'm not sure what to say apart from this. i think the problem being i just came off reading Dexter which i found to be intensly Brilliant, so was a bit of a come down.

would i read another Stephanie Plum? sure, probably not in a hurry, but when i need something silly but ok to read. (Two for the Money is on my to-read shelf ;)

initially i gave One for the Money 2 stars but decided to bump up to 3.

p.s. 'pocketbook' - what a horrible name for a handbag!

Down River, by John Hart--my review.

If you take any kind of Acting classes where they make you do improvisation, or they give you some kind of scenario to expand on, or even if you're handed a scene from out of Shakespeare or something, some advice you might get is not to start out too intense or angry. This is because the scene needs somewhere to go. It needs to build. If you start out at a high level of anger, you can't take it up to the next level, because you're already there.

Even if the Instructor loves your intensity, and lets it go a few times, it will get to be TOO MUCH, and you'll be asked to tone it down...

Enter author John Hart, and his crime novel, Down River...

This book starts out intense, stays intense, and ends intense. There is virtually no humour in these pages at all. Yes, on the face of it, why should there be? This is the story of a young man who must flee his rural family life, once his stepmother fingers him for a brutal murder. The father takes her side. Many in the town assume he's guilty--well, I mean after all, there's an eyewitness. But he gets off due to the glaring problem of no motive.

Actually, that's the backstory for Down River. That happened five years before the book begins. The story begins with our accused but acquitted murder suspect returning home thanks to a cry for help. And when he gets home, there's nothing but bitter feeling all around. Everyone one he encounters seems to have some reason to make his life miserable...either for coming back, or running off in the first place. An ex-lover, siblings, the long arm of the law, the father, and do I even need to mention the hostility of the stepmother?

It's all very intense. It's VERY intense. Everyone is very upset. Rival factions either opposing or supporting a big-money land development deal--with threats flying around (chiefly directed at our protagonist's stubborn father) don't help things any. Then there's an assault, and guess who is the best suspect! Later, there's a corpse, and as people stop saying "I'm furious and I don't want to talk about it--Go away!", and instead start saying "I'm finally going to get this off my chest...", all the dirty dirty secrets come out.

I give this book 4 stars out of 5. Though I worry about this writer milking intensity and angst for all it's worth in book after book. The pace of this story is great, but when you marry that with a kind of bleak, angry narrative that never relaxes and takes a breath, you get a book that may not appeal to everyone. If the book has a weakness, it is that after the first 50 pages, it has nowhere else to go, in terms of mood and intensity. The "family secrets" aspect of the plot is not entirely fresh, but does have some fresh angles; I confess that I had something all figured out pages before it was revealed...and then when it was revealed (at the moment I expected) it turned out I was completely wrong! So that sort of trickery is a plus! And there's nothing like relentless intensity to keep the pages turning. But I can't help feeling it was all a bit much. Certainly I might not be as riveted if this went on in the author's next book.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

5 stars

Margaret Lea, an amateur biographer, received a letter from a well known novelist to hear her story. The novelist, Vida Winter, is known to always tell a glamorous and different stories of herself when asked. Intrigued, Margaret decides to at least visit and at least speak to this mysterious persona. From then on, she was drawn to the story like a moth to a light.

I was really looking forward to reading this book that I was scared of being let down. BUT from the top of page 2, I was completely sucked in - the specific line was "I was so seduced by the descriptions of...". THat's it, I was gone, I was seduced, trapped yet not willing to let go.

The language employed was amazing. I love the words used to described locations, the weather, the sky, the feelings, etc. It's one of the best mystery novels I've read in a long time.

Note: I love the doctor's diagnose of her 'ilness', it tickled me to no end. I'd buy the book for keeps just for that. lol

THE DAUGHTER OF TIME by Josehine Tey
5 stars

This book was not your typical mystery novel. It begins with a police inspector injured by all things, by falling through a trapdoor. Inspector Grant in intested in faces. One of his friends brought him several portraits of individuals involved in mystery. In the stack was a portrait of Richard III. To end his boredom while bedbound, he looks into the history surrounding Edward IV, Richard III, the Princes in the Tower, and Henry VII. With the help of a young American working at the British Museum, they build a case against the true villian in the story and what really happened to the sons of Edward IV, known as the Princes in the Tower.

I found this book engrossing. It is a quick read with just over 200 pages. I will be reading more of the books by Josephine Tey

Hold Tight by Harlan Coben~4 stars
This was my first read by this author but it won't be my last. It was a quick read, good characters, timely issues...what's not to love?

THE GLASS OF TIME, by Michael Cox -- 2.5 stars

This summer I read "The Meaning of Night", the book that comes before "The Glass of Time". (Not sure if this will turn into a longer series, or if it will just be these two of the author's books that are related.) While, I enjoyed "The Glass of Time" for the most part, it was a bit of a letdown after "The Meaning of Night". TGOT sucked me in and I really enjoyed the first 300 or so pages, but I had some issues with how the author dramatically presented a lot of the material as the book wore on. First of all, if you read TMON, most of the "revelations" in TGOT are not new to you. It almost makes you wonder if you should read the books in reverse order, thinking of TMON as a prequel. Also, one of the central relationships is not fleshed out well enough, in my opinion, and takes away a lot of the impact that the last 1/3 of the book could have carried. I think this book is worth reading if you've read TMON and really enjoyed it. It is interesting to get a different take on the events of that book. However, I'm not sure I can recommend TGOT on its own.

Angel, I agree about "One for the Money". I thought it was fun, and will keep the Steph Plum books in mind for when I'm in the mood for a "beach read" or something enjoyable and quick. However, I'm not sure that I will end up feeling the mania for the series that others do. We'll see.

The Cold Dish By Craig Johnson - 4 stars

This was good mystery and is the first of the Sheriff Walt Longmire series. I liked the characters in this book. They were engaging and humorous in spite of the subject matter which, as the title suggests, is a story of revenge.

I liked the dialogue and the descriptions of the Wyoming landscape. The foul-mouthed deputy, the steadfast Cherokee friend, the beautiful but somewhat enigmatic lady friend all wound together to make a decent mystery and fun read.

By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, by Agatha Christie-- my review.

The word on some of Ms. Christie's later works is that they can be a bit incoherent, fuzzy, muddled...thus of course making them lesser crime novels. My experience has been that this is true. Witness By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, which--when you compare it to something like And Then There Were None, written when the author was at the top of her form-- glimmers with some of the old magic, but does crumble into confusion just a tad in the late-going. To wit: it don't all fit together right.

This mystery novel, first published in 1968, was Agatha Christie's attempt to bring back her detecting duo Tommy & Tuppence, a married couple with a talent for getting immersed in danger. I must have read their first outing-- The Secret Adversary--way back when I was, oh, maybe about thirteen years old. It made a huge impression on me. It is a cracking good mystery; it was fun watching the subplot of two young sleuths fall in love; and it opened my eyes to the fact that espionage and spy-jinks, with their link to world affairs most likely in the arena of politics, could be a fun part of a mystery, even for a youngster (taking a chance on Eye Of The Needle, by Ken Follett, at around this time of my life, also cemented my attraction to spy fiction).

Anyway, I only read Agatha Christie books occasionally in my adult life, and besides seeking out Poirot's herculean efforts of detection--cuz he's a legend--I like to check in with Tommy & Tuppence now and then. Postern Of Fate was, interestingly, my return to the adventures of these sleuthing lovebirds, and I recall very little about the book, except that--as one of Ms. Christie's last books--it was...strange. And, yes, muddled. A book not tamed and made complete. By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, thankfully, is not that bad. In fact, it's kind of fun, as a Halloweeny-ish pick (I'm reading a lot of Horror these days, too). I do wish that Tommy & Tuppence--older now--would have got mixed up in more international/political/"who's the bad spy" intrigue, but instead, with this tale, they investigate the disappearance and likely murder of an old woman in a nursing home. A creepy nursing home. The trail leads to a village in rural England. A creepy village. With a creepy house. A creepy house with split personalities, if that makes sense (it will if you read it). All of this because of a creepy painting, which has also undergone a creepy...adjustment. The painting of the house is what leads Tuppence to take the train out to Creepyville, England (my nomenclature for now), WITHOUT her husband, who's connection to spy-stuff--now that he's aged somewhat--seems only to get invited to dreary international seminars and talks that serve mainly, it seems, to take him out of the action long enough for his wife to find out just enough village secrets to get her bashed on the head, after which she goes missing too!

Yikes.

The problem with the book is that once Tuppence is nosing around the creepy village, she and the readers get subjected to an onslaught of info that seems to be taking the story in various directions, not all of which end up mattering. HEY, don't get me wrong, I'm all for red herrings and false trails--but at the end of this book, when an evil-doer is cornered (well, actually the evil-doer is the one doing the cornering, as we see one of our detectives in extreme jeopardy from a fairly depraved individual!) we get "the Evil-Doer's Grand, Explanatory Speech". Which is fine, I suppose. Except that said Speech refers in a kind of halfhazard fashion to lots of info thrown at us at about the mid-portion of the book, and it is hard at that point to mentally travel back and sort through what was relevant, half-relevant, and total balderdash or idle gossip. Even when one does the sorting and remembering (or simply does a re-skim of earlier gossip, chitchat, and history-of-the-area burbling), what does emerge is a scenario based on some strange and tenuous logic. It's as if the author had thrown in a bunch of stuff willy-nilly for shock-value, and when she shakes it all out at at the end, she does it a bit confusingly (which was not a problem in the earlier books), and does it that way so that we hopefully don't notcie that it's kind of a weak idea in the first place, full of things that seemed important, but turned out not so important after all. Although having said that, there is one aspect of the original premise that brings to mind Agatha Christie's old expertise at making one believe something completely, and then it simply gets turned over on its head!!

This looked like a great Agatha Christie choice for the Halloween season, specifically, but it was really only mildly satisfying. Mood: good. Mystery: merely adequate, with lumps. I would suggest, instead, A Murder Is Announced, or The Hollow, or Curtain: Poirot's Last Case (my personal Christie fave). If you are less interested in Christie as Creepy, and more interested in meeting Tommy & Tuppence, proceed immediately to The Secret Adversary.

What's a Ghoul to Do? by Victoria Laurie
Somewhere between 3.5-4 stars

This was a pretty quick read. Very fun. You definitely have to suspend reality to believe in the whole ghost hunter thing, but I was able to. I will say, compared to the stuff I've been reading lately, the writing quality is subpar. At certain points, I felt like I was reading something I could have written in high school (the same jokes were used throughout). It was a fun read, though, and Laurie was able to keep me interested in what was happening next with ghost hunter M.J. Holliday and her sidekick Gilley Gillespie as they try to help Dr. Steven Sable solve the mystery behind the death of his grandfather and rid his lodge of ghosts who refuse to move on.

Aunt Dimity's Death by Nancy Atherton

Aunt Dimity’s Death is the first book in a cozy mystery series by Nancy Atherton. Maybe I enjoyed this so much because I’m a sucker for cozy mysteries, but I also loved Lori and Bill’s budding romance and the friendly paranormal visits by Aunt Dimity. Immediately after finishing Aunt Dimity’s Death, I rated it five stars and added every other book in the series to my “to-read” list. The library copy I read was signed by the author and stamped with a large, pink bunny stamp – which is significant if you know the story.

Luann,

I read Aunt Dimity's Death a few months ago and I LOVED it! I love the term "cozy mystery"--I think that fits it perfectly. I am adding the books in the series one by one, but haven't read another yet.

Enjoy!

I am finally finished. I was almost worried I wouldn't make it in October, but I did and I am glad. I really did love this book.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.


The Thirteenth Tale is a story of a biographer and an author who has never told her life story. She writes Margaret to offer her the chance, but Margaret is slightly put off by all the stories she has told in liu of her biography. However, she visits her out of curiousity and Vida Winter sparks her interest.

I thoroughly enjoyed the two story lines and compelling ways the lives of Vida Winter and Margaret Lea interweave. The characters is Miss Winter's story are intriguing and leave the reader wanting more. In addition, the whole novel was written with such case of the language that I loved every sentence.

I JUST picked up Case Histories from the library yesterday, so I will be running a little behind. I have to finish American Gods first.

Just finished Demons Are a Ghoul's Best Friend. Man, this one was much better in my opinion than What's a Ghoul to Do?. We joined Ghost Hunters M.J. Holliday and Gilley Gillespie and their new partner Dr. Steven Sable as they head up to Lake Placid to help rid a boarding school of a hatchet-wielding poltergiest. This one creeped me out a lot more than the other. I felt the mystery was a little more developed than the first book in the series. Laurie redeemed herself by not really repeating a lot of the situations that occurred in the first book. That's one thing I can't stand about series books -- when they tell you what's happened in the last book or in the first books of the series. She also chilled out a bit with the language barrier jokes.

I give this one 4.5 stars! Looking forward to March of 2009, when the next book comes out.

oh, Mel, I read What's a Ghoul to Do a while ago... it was ok but I wasn't interested enough to pick up the next one but since you think the second book is better I might look into it :)

Karen, I was almost insulted reading the first one at some points. If you learn to look past some of her writing shortcomings, the story are much better. I do like how I'm DYING to get through the last 60 pages or so, when things start to fall together. Give it a try, I'm glad I did.

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins - This book was pretty good (I gave it 4 stars). I enjoyed how the book changed perspectives and methods of storytelling throughout, and it was pretty engaging. I did think, however, that some of the characters were quite dense at times (it was a bit frustrating that they couldn't see the obvious). Additionally, I found the major events and the conclusion to be not at all surprising. Check out the book's page for a summary.

An Irish Solution, by Cormac Millar--my review.

Well, despite my claims to the contrary (on another Thread), I managed to cram in one more crime/mystery read this month!

This Cormac Millar novel--which gives a fictional treatment to drug-trafficking in Ireland and the narcos who combat it--is a bit complicated, but does decide to gradually unravel itself in the back half. There are a lot of characters, be they high or low-level criminals, corrupt or non-corrupted law enforcement officials (including lead character Seamus Joyce of the Irish Drug Enforcement Agency), schoolgirls and nuns, healthy or ailing wives or mistresses or girlfriends, reporters and internet hackers, and some visitors from Germany and the United States who have become involved in Ireland's drug-prevention plans of the future, whatever they may be. There's also violence, murder, bribery, alleged pedophilia, and, if we're lucky, a hero or two. One clean lawman tries to stop the frame-up of a semi-respectable twit who is tricked into taking the fall for...well, arguably a whole lot of gangsters and a whack of sleazy cops and politicians. Some of it even works out nice. Some of it stays a bit confusing. 3 stars.

I finished 4th of July by James Patterson this morning. I had stopped reading the Women's Murder Club series after 3rd Degree, where at the very end of the book, there is a HUGE factual error. I'm glad I picked them back up, though. They are a quick, fun read. But, let me tell you, I never knew San Francisco had such a serial killer problem! :-P But, anyway, this was a nice change of pace, in a way. I agree with what Julie had told me when I started that this book was a nice look at the other side of being a cop. Anyway, I gave it 4 stars and am actually looking forward to reading 5th Degree at some point.

Guess I got here a bit too late with my last mystery book for October, but I thought I'd mention it anyway. I just finished The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith and will be giving it 2 stars. At first, I thought it was going to be a charming little mystery. As it rambled on in many, many philosophical tangents, though, it just got tedious. This was not a quick read, as I'd imagined. Really, it felt like all of the philosophical stuff was just filler for a not-so-exciting mystery. In the end, the mystery was solved abruptly with a bunch of loose ends remaining. Throughout the book, the language and tone got on my nerves a bit, as well. Like this: "Perhaps one became accustomed to doing things well and then felt frustrated when one did other things less well" - using the word "one" all the time may sound proper, but (to me) it doesn't make for very fun reading! I doubt I'll go any further with this series.