false 33 178 177 true 5651697 read 1 true 1663487 currently-reading 0 true 1663486 to-read 67 false 1663488 mysteries 53 false 1663967 paranormal-romance 7 false 1902556 modern-fiction 6 false 2482273 magical-realism 5 false 1664051 witchy-stuff 3 false 3918028 fantasy--urban 2 false 2140123 fantasy 2 false 1874906 romance--hot-and-steamy 2 false 3888140 tarot 1 false 2005586 memoir 1 false 1965756 researching--- 1 false 1931149 children-s-books http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78682649 to: The Winter Garden Mystery (Daisy Dalrymple Mysteries, #2) by Carola Dunn
bookshelves: mysteries
The Honorable Daisy Dalyrmple is the daughter of a peer. In this time between the wars, she earns her own living and an emancipated act that brings both admiration and censure for a lady of her class. She works as a writer for th magazine and writes about the great old houses of England.

She goes to the home of one of her schoolgirl friends, a hearty sporty girl named Bobbie. What she found was a household dominated by the demanding and snobbish Lady Valeria. As she goes about her research, she witnesses the discovery of the body of a runaway maid. The suspects are many including the Adonis-like son of the house. The maid's fiance is accused.

Daisy does not believe the gardener is guitly so she calls in her friend Alec Fletcher from Scotland yard. The mystery unfolds as does the tentative attraction between Daisy and Alec.

A charming and well done cozy! ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/77857614 to: 3 Men And A Body (Body Movers, #3) by Stephanie Bond
bookshelves: mysteries
Carlotta and her brother Wesley continue to weave a complicated web of intentional and unintentional deception with each other and with the people trying to help them.

Beginning exactly where the other book left off, Carlotta is home recuperating from her injuries, nursing an injured soul. Wesley is missing, kidnapped by the loan shark he tricked. Now both of them have more secrets and menance. Carolotta continues to keep three men on a string, moving back and forth into seduction and out again. She cannot make up her mind, is led by her hormones, and inhibited by the unresolved conflicts her her life.

Of course there's a mystery to solve and she moves into the middle of it led by her curiosity and boredom. The mystery itself is entertaining and well spun with a satisfactory and injurious ending. Carlotta spends a lot of time inadvertently getting hurt and narrowly escaping death.

The ongoing story about her parent's flight from justice deepens and becomes more complicated to the point of being tiresome. I like the characters and the writing but enough already, solve this mystery. That way Carlotta can decide which man is for her. It's not sexual tension with witty repartee any more. Time for a new plot. This one is twisted and annoying. I'm going to keep reading the series in the hopes that what is good and endearing about these character endures and what has become boring just fades away. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/75660516 to: Death At Wentwater Court (Daisy Dalrymple Mysteries, #1) by Carola Dunn
bookshelves: mysteries
This series takes place between the wars in England. WWI has hit England hard, both in the hearts of the people and on the class system. Daisy Dalyrmple is the daughter of a peer and as an Honorable, she was brought up in the midst of the upper class. Having lost her brother, fiance, and father in the war, she is now determined to make her way as a writer-reporter and photographer. Her title and upbringing gives her entre into many social circles.

Her magazine sends her to the home of the Earl of Wentwater to write an article on their stately home. She is among friends and is acquainted with the younger generation. She goes in the middle of a winter house party. The guests all have hidden agendas and there is menance in the social discourse and behavior.

One of the guests turns up dead, seemingly accidental. Daisy's curiosity, astute observations, and camera pick up clues to the contrary. Working with the "dishy" Scotland Yard detective, she discovers the truth of the murder.

A very satisfactory mystery full of compassion, period details and hinting at sorrows of the past and a romance that will need to break the barriers of class and snobbery. Well written, it pulls you into the story. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/75660156 to: 2 Bodies For The Price Of 1 (Body Movers, #2) by Stephanie Bond
bookshelves: mysteries
This book starts exactly at the moment the first, Body Movers, leaves off with a phone call from her errant, bail-jumping father. Carlotta drops the phone and through a series of unfortunate incidents is unable to take the call. Her life becomes more complicated as her identity is stolen and her double winds up dead.

Her brother is still in a lot of trouble with loan sharks and his probation. Three men are pursuing Carlotta for romance but with her identity stolen, her parents on the lam, her disingenous brother constantly making mistakes, she barely has time to think let alone fall in love.

This series is light, clever, witty, and engaging with likeable fun and funny characters and interesting story lines. The endings are not predictable. I look forward to reading the others in the series. I like Carlotta and her brother and no wonder she has trouble choosing among the men, though I do have my favorite.

Wise cracking chick lit meets light hearted mystery! ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/74448868 to: Living the Vida Lola: A Lola Cruz Mystery (Lola Cruz Mysteries) by Misa Ramirez
bookshelves: mysteries
I had to read a book with the character named Lola and Living the vida Lola! Lola is one of my fantasy names!!

And this book is great. Lola is an almost thirty something girl living in Sacremento upstairs from her parents. To their eternal consternation and disapproval, she's a black belt and a private detective. She is living her career dream ever since she stalked her brother's friend Jack when she was 14.

Lola fields a missing person case. As she starts to investigate she finds a card of a reporter who is -- lo and behold -- Jack, he of her adolescent fantasies and stalker behavior. As they move inexorably and sexily together, the case takes on a more dangerous and complicated turn. Exciting and funny, Lola solves the mystery and gets the guy, well at least sort of. Lots of unanswered and intriguing questions to be explored in a sequel...or two...or three.

Funny, fun, and an affectionate look at tightly knit Mexican-American families through the eyes of a woman who is both traditional and modern; cool and old-fashioned. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/74096292 to: Body Movers (Body Movers, #1) by Stephanie Bond
bookshelves: mysteries
Carlotta is barely keeping it together. Ten years ago her parents were under indictment for embezzlement when they skipped town, leaving 18 year old Carlotta to raise her nine year old geeky brother Wesley. Her fiance dumped her and married someone else in her former social class.

Now she works on commission at Neiman Marcus, serving her former fiance's rich bitch of a wife, and trying to keep her brother safe from loan sharks. Wesley is arrested for hacking and her tenuous finances become more strained as she deals with collectors, murder, her former fiance, a cop with a professional interest in her parents' disappearance and other interests in her own pretty self. When the wife is murdered, life becomes more complicated as Carlotta tries to find sense in life, to find the murder, and to just survive. Oh yeah, and Wesley's on parole with a real job picking up bodies for the morgue, working with another hunky man with a past.

Charming, engaging, absurd, and believable. Everyone has secrets they keep badly and try as hard as they can to survive and thrive in this chick lit, comedy, mystery. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73379357 to: Julia's Chocolates (Paperback) by Cathy Lamb
In the first line, Julia tells us she leaves her wedding dress hanging from a tree in North Dakota, as she leaves Boston and drives away from her abusive and dangerous fiance on their wedding day. Her black eye a reminder of how narrowly she escaped a marriage of abuse and humiliation.

She goes to her Aunt Lydia, a feisty, strong, eccentric woman who lives on a farm in Golden Oregon. In this small town, Julia with her big boobs, wild hair, and damaged psyche, finds friendship, safety, and strength. She finds a refuge from her terrifying childhood and engagement, and finally begins to heal. A circle of women, all experiencing their own kind of pain, gather weekly at Julia for Psychic Night where Lydia exhorts the women to know their breast power, know the power of their vagina and more.

Julia creates a beautiful, powerful life but one bordered by panic and fear as she knows her fiance will find her and kill her. As she immerses herself in the embrace of her community, she finds the strength to make her stand, to become more whole, and to love not only a lover, but a family chosen by her own heart.

The stories of the women in this book are not unusual (unfortunately) nor is the plot unusual. The characters and the writing pull you into the story and find their way into your heart. You are rooting for Julia to love her wild hair, big boobs, and tattered psyche and you laugh hysterically at the crazy-right philosophy of Aunt Lydia.

Anyone who was/is a feminist in the 1970s and early 1980s will find the subject matter of the Psychic Night not only familiar but hysterically funny!

And you have to love a book where chocolate saves a woman's life, her sanity, and her love!! Go chocolate. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73378622 to: The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Hardcover) by Alan Bradley
bookshelves: mysteries
It's post World War II England, and eleven year old Flavia de Luce lives on her family estate, Buckshaw, with her sisters Ophelia and Daphne and their widowed, withdrawn, and reclusive father. Flavia's father rarely emerges from his study where he spends his time mourning their mother's death and working with his stamp collection.

The girls are left to their own devices guided only very lightly by some devoted family retainers. Flavia, the youngest, is passionate about chemistry. She occupies one wing of their old family mansion delving into old experiments and journals left by long deceased family members. Her main area of interest is poisons, which she studies deeply.

Life is fully of sibling rivalry; the kind that resourceful and intellgent children left to their own devices can pursue. One day a dead bird with a stamp stuck on its beak is left on the doorstep. Her father is noticeably upset and Flavia's considerable curosity is piqued. Then Flavia discovers a dead body in the cabbage patch.

As the police investigate and set their sites on her father, the resourceful and too-smart-for-her-own-good Flavia pursues her own investigation. It's a terrific adventure and the introduction to another eccentric, likeable heroine.

This is a great book and reminds me of the English stories for children; books by Arthur Ransome and E. Nesbit where the adults are faded and ineffectual and the children are perspicacious, precocious, adventurous, fearless, resourceful, and effective. Flavia is a great heroine, reaching logical and erroneous conclusions and being an absolute pest to the police.

This is the start of a new series and one worth reading more and more! ]]>