Paul Austin Ardoin's Blog, page 14

Bookmas Day Six

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

This was a hot release in 2012, it won a bunch of awards, and like The Reluctant Coroner, it was a debut novel that started life as a National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) project. A beautiful story, lushly told—I wanted to go to this circus so badly when I was reading it. Part mystery, part adventure, part fantasy, this book is powerful and emotional. I heard others say the characters were poorly developed, but the circus itself is a character—and it showed me a lot of surprising things I hadn't seen in novels before. It's a fantastic, engrossing read—one of those books where you're disappointed you've only got 20 pages left.
 

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Five Golden Rings

The Slim Hardy Mysteries by Jack Benton

A deeply flawed, alcoholic detective, a couple of twenty-year-old cold cases, and a satisfyingly odd cast of characters. There are some tough things to read in this series (the third book comes out in February), but it’s quite well put-together, even though the ending of the second book is almost too neatly wrapped up. I loved The Clockmaker's Secret—the second book in the series, which I read first. The first book, The Man by the Sea, has a narrative that is a bit choppy, but the plot still works well, and there's a glimmer of the supernatural.

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The Fourth Day of Bookmas

Dr. Lillian Whyte Adventures by CB Samet

I loved the character of Dr. Lillian Whyte, who circles the globe in this trilogy. She is fiercely intelligent and more than a little headstrong, and fights war profiteers and terrorists, disarming biomedical weapons and disabling nuclear threats along the way. Samet makes her villains compelling too. I was one of Samet's beta readers for the third book in the trilogy, and liked it so much I went back and bought the whole trilogy. Right now, the trilogy is sold as a $9.99 set. Samet writes romantic suspense and award-winning fantasy novels too.

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The Third Day of Bookmas

Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

Several years ago, a hilarious story in a blogpost about the adventures of Beyoncé the Big Metal Chicken (and bath towels) went viral. And the blogpost's author, Jenny Lawson, published a memoir a couple of years later. It's the funniest book I've ever read; while I have a penchant for hyperbole, I do not exaggerate here. I read it on an airplane and I was laughing so hard tears were rolling down my face. My seatmates were pretty horrified. 

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On the Second Day of Bookmas

The Zachary Goldman Mysteries by P.D. Workman

P.D. Workman has created a deeply flawed but very compelling character in Zachary Goldman. His background is tragic and his ability to interact with the world and appear "normal" is one of his greatest daily challenges, and both informs and hinders his work as a private investigator. I recommend starting with the first book in the series, She Wore Mourning. The central mystery is heartbreaking—a "cold case" that's the drowning death of a five-year-old—and there are plenty of twists and turns on the way to solving it. The dead child's parents are fascinating to read about, needing to keep it together through their non-neuronormative conditions. Workman writes these characters very well: their conditions don't define them, and the reader easily sees the real people where society might only see the conditions.

By the way, if you're a cozy mystery fan, P.D. Workman's book Gluten-Free Murder appears in the Cozy Winter Reads six-book set, available for $2.99 for a limited time.

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12 Days of Bookmas

On the first day of Bookmas, an author gave to me: a fabulous book recommendation.

Happy Boxing Day! It's time to fill those new eReaders, so I've compiled some recommendations to get you started. If you've been a subscriber for awhile, you know that I'm a huge fan of the Sue Grafton Alphabet Mysteries, Faith Martin's Hillary Greene series, and, of course, Harry Potter (I'm a Hufflepuff, btw). Besides those three, here are 12 more of my favorite books and book series—not all of these are mysteries, but they're all great. You might have seen me promote and/or review these in previous newsletters, and that's because I like them so much!

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Merry Christmas! Announcing Fenway 3

I wish you and yours all the best this holiday. And here's my gift to you, loyal reader: The Candidate Coroner

I'm excited to share that I've completed my first draft of The Candidate Coroner, the third book in the Fenway Stevenson mystery series!

Picking up three months after the end of The Incumbent Coroner, Fenway must solve the murder of a rich philanderer—when her young, hated, trophy-wife stepmother emerges as the lead suspect. Balancing her coroner duties with her re-election campaign, Fenway uncovers a nefarious international scheme that threatens her life. Can Fenway solve the mystery before it's too late—and before Election Day?

The book is with early readers right now, and once I make another couple of rounds of changes, I'll be sending it to my editor! I hope to have the book released in the first quarter of 2019.

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Death and Damages: The Scarlet Stiletto review

The new ebook-only mega-release Death and Damages is here, and it features 24 mystery and thriller novels, novellas, and stories for only 99¢.

One of the 24 books in the Death and Damages mega-release is Maggie Carpenter’s The Scarlet Stiletto.

The novella features Patrick McGuire, a pre-World War II New York private detective, who gets hired by the curvy blonde bombshell Ruby Rose Rogan to investigate her husband’s murder. Carpenter has her tongue firmly planted in her cheek with the McGuire character (down to the trenchcoat and fedora) and Ruby Rose character (who I kept expecting to say, “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way). From the third chapter, the larger question of Ruby Rose’s guilt—did she or didn’t she—crosses paths with the real question of the book, which is: will they or won’t they?

Carpenter has written best-selling romance novels, and it shows: her ease at writing the scenes between McGuire and Ruby Rose crackle with sexual tension. The mystery is well-plotted, too. The secondary characters are mostly expected tropes—the dumber-than-dirt gangsters, the wise old police captain, the nosy neighbor—but the plot keeps pushing forward so that the readers hardly notices the less-than-well-rounded characters. In short, this book is a lot of fun to read.

Get Death and Damages while it's available—it's a limited release and will only be available for a few months.

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Death and Damages: Vengeance review

John Ling, Vengeance

The new ebook-only mega-release Death and Damages is here, and it features 24 mystery and thriller novels, novellas, and stories for only 99¢.

One of the 24 stories is a novel by John Ling called Vengeance. And if this story is any indication of the quality you’ll find in the other stories, it will be ninety-nine cents well spent.

The story features Maya Raines as a CIA operative with strong ties to Malaysia—and a tendency to go off the reservation. Her driving motivation is revenge for her father’s murder. Maya is tough but compassionate, and her nemesis, a Sunni operative named Jamal Sidek, is the most well-rounded character in the book. You’ll find many of the expected tropes here: the boss who both hates Maya’s rogue tendencies but loves her tenacity; the wisecracking team members; and the woman serving as Maya’s guide who she never quite trusts—but never quite mistrusts either.

The plot charges forward from the get-go: the threat of Maya being exposed at a checkpoint, a rooftop chase, a daring helicopter rescue—Ling puts the pedal to the metal from the first scene and doesn’t let up until the epilogue. It’s a page-turning, immersive book, and I couldn’t believe that I had finished the book so quickly when it was over. Definitely recommended.

Get Death and Damages while it's available—it's a limited release.

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Wildfire Relief: How you can help

Three weeks ago, my daughter’s recreational soccer team played a team from Paradise, California, about 90 miles north of my home near Sacramento. A week later, every single girl and every single coach on that team lost their houses in the wildfire that devastated Paradise.

They weren’t alone—the town is destroyed, and more than 10,000 homes were destroyed too, displacing an estimated 30,000 people.

The biggest thing that the community needs? Cash. Two local groups that are doing a ton of work are North Valley Community Foundation (NVCF), based in the neighboring town of Chico, and the Enloe Foundation, specifically to help patients and medical staff who have lost everything.

If you live in Northern California, please consider adopting a displaced family, and join the Facebook group to find a family you can help. (There are also links where you can purchase items that the families need, particularly important with the holidays coming.)

The church down the street from our house got together with our local bowling alley and, together, they're hosting Thanksgiving dinner for hundreds of displaced families. My family is spending today volunteering, prepping sweet potatoes and cranberry relish. In addition, I will donate all the royalties of Bad Weather for the rest of 2018—both e-book and paperback—to NVCF and Enloe.

Thanks for listening, and I hope you and yours have a very Happy Thanksgiving and a wonderful holiday season.

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