Mystery Lovers! discussion
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What are you reading? Do you recommend it?
Finished Dogs of Babel-interesting concept,but a little guesome,especially if you're an animal lover. Boy, Mark do I ID with you. I can't tell you how often I go to type in a title or author and go blank. :D
I just finished The Maze. It was a 5 star book in my opinion. It had great characters, and intriguing villain, and crazy family members. It grips you within the first few chapters. You really fall in love with the main character, Lacey. She is so strong, likable, protective, and unwavering in her thoughts and ideas. Loved it!!
I am currently reading the new Joanne Fluke "Cinnamon Roll Murder" having a hard time getting into this one hopefully it gets better the further I get into the book.
Mark wrote: "Dogs Of Babel is that by Carolyn Parkhurst?? Good book"Yep, Packhurst. And yes, a bit gruesome too...
The Shadows of Shigatse Vol. III of The Handover Mysteries is now finally in paperback, making the paperback series complete along with the Kindle/Smashwords editions.Thanks for all the great feedback!
The Shadows of Shigatse
Mark wrote: "Just starting Sinister Heights by Loren D. Estlemansorta new author for me, any comments?"
Estleman is a very fine mystery writer - great use of language and very accurate presenter of human behavior
Thanks, Jim I agree, jsut finished listening to Island Of Vice about Teddy Rossevelt's tenure as NYC police commissioner, tedious.
Jennifer wrote: "Just finished The Drop
. I do love Harry Bosch and this was one of the best."I love Harry as well. He reminds me of Stuart Woods Stone Barrington.
Don't see the correlation there, Stone I view as a NYC sophisticate and Harry as sorta of a hard working schlepper. But I love them both.
I have just started Fragile Eternity and for anyone starting this series GR and the books say that Ink Exchange is the second novel but to me it is a cast off to a different series. After reading Wicked Lovely I picked up Ink Exchange and was lost.
Tracy wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Just finished The Drop
. I do love Harry Bosch and this was one of the best."I love Harry as well. He reminds me of Stuart Woods Sto..."
Connelly is almost in a league of his own love Bosch
character
reading VULTURE PEAK by John Burdettexcellent read with a lot of droll humor even though it's a mystery and about organ trafficking
Tracy wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Just finished The Drop
. I do love Harry Bosch and this was one of the best."I love Harry as well. He reminds me of Stuart Woods Sto..."
How funny, I'd never even heard of Stone Barrington until this last week, when I happened to pick one up from my library's audio collection, and here I find this comment spurring me on. Synchronicity! :-)
Last night I finished ellen Crosby's RIESLING RETRIBUTION. A fun read! This is the fourth (I think) in her series set in Virginia's wine country. This one involves solving a thirty-year-old murder and preventing a new one, and it takes place amidst the chaos of a Civil War battle re-enactment, something we have a lot of in Virginia! The writing is top quality, which is important to me. I've gotten so I just can't read a book that isn't well-written. I recommend the whole series--you can read them out of order without losing much, but I prefer to stick to the sequence.
Harlan Coben - Deal Breaker - A Myron Bolitar Novel...... I love these books by Harlan Coban he is a awesome writer the kind of writer you dont want to but the book down till you know what happens.
Closing in on the end of both The Reversal
and Jolie Blon's Bounce
and enjoying both. Two of my favorite mystery authors. Next up will be Crocodile on the Sandbank
.
I just finished Never Look Away: A Thriller. WOW!! What a thriller! The last 50 pages were electric!
'Nother one down-- 29 to go in this batch! Finished Jolie Blon's Bounce
last night. James Lee Burke is one of my 4 or 5 favorite mystery authors and he does two things extraordinarily well-- first, he mixes description in with narrative so well that you don't realize a picture is being painted. You wind up with a story set in a place that arose fully formed in your mind as the story unfolded. The second thing is dialogue. His dialogue reveals his characters even as it communicates and pushes the story forward. And I'm sorry, I just love Clete Purcel. I realize he is intensely flawed and there is almost nothing about him that withstands scrutiny-- but, dude.
Jennifer wrote: "'Nother one down-- 29 to go in this batch! Finished Jolie Blon's Bounce
last night. James Lee Burke is one of my 4 or 5 favorite mystery authors ..."JLB is the best, easily one of my all time favorites,I also love David Halberstam, Pat Conroy, and George Pelecanos. Any one of those four could write the dictionary and I would read it.
Jennnifer you are not the only fan of Clete Percell. He is just such an honorable Bastard. Mark I will have to try Halverstam. I love all the other authors you listed. I just have not read him.
I just finished The Mephisto Club. The story was really creepy and dark. Talks of demons and Satan that could keep one up were unnerving. The story line was intriguing. It just held my attention. I love how the author had each chapter alternate between characters and how it was woven into the plot. A great read, 5 stars.
Mark wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "'Nother one down-- 29 to go in this batch! Finished Jolie Blon's Bounce
last night. James Lee Burke is one of my 4 or 5 favorite..."Haven't read Pelecanos. Conroy I love but he's so emotionally intense I have to let a long time elapse between reading his books. My current elapse period is about 15 years. And counting. Yet I love his work!
Halberstam- I couldn't care less about basketball yet I was riveted by his book about Michael Jordan. What a good writer.
Two more down. 27 left in this batch. I love when I get near the end of a set of 8 or 10, and I'm so close to being done with most of them that they fall like dominoes. Accomplishment, and off to a new bunch, all at the same time. The Reversal
-- didn't see the end of this one coming!The Winter Garden Mystery
-- the second in this series. Took me a bit to get absorbed in it but it paid off in the end. The first one was the same way for me.
Jennifer wrote: "Tracy wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Just finished The Drop
. I do love Harry Bosch and this was one of the best."I love Harry as well. He reminds me of St..."
So Jennifer, what did you think? Did you read Stone Barrington? Which one did you read?
I just finished Believing the Lie by Elizabeth George. It's another great addition to the Inspector Lynley series. I especially enjoyed the Havers content. I will continue to look forward to more from this author. Definitely recommended.
Tracy wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Tracy wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Just finished The Drop
. I do love Harry Bosch and this was one of the best."I love Harry as well. He..."
Haven't read it yet- I'm determined to get through my current "next up list" of 27 books before I tackle anything new so it will be a few weeks yet before Stone gets his shot.
I just finished
. The story was riveting. It had me from chapter one. I thoroughly enjoyed the characters. The suspense had my heart racing. I never could predict the ending and I love Daisy!!
Jannene wrote: "I just finished
. The story was riveting. It had me from chapter one. I thoroughly enjoyed the characters. The suspense had my heart racing. I never could predict the..."I love Holly Barker. Have you read Stone Barrington yet? He is great as well.
Tracy, this was the first Stuart Woods book that I have read. My father-in-law gave me the 2nd and 3rd in the series above and one from Stone Barrington...I think that one is the 4th in the series. I hate reading them out of order so I bought the first in this series so I could read the others. I heard the 2nd one wasn't quite as good as the one I just finished.
I don't know, I liked it but I love the whole series. I wish he would bring here back. Although, Holly and Stone do bump into each other in the Barrington series but I like Holly on her own as well.
Renee wrote: "Jennnifer you are not the only fan of Clete Percell. He is just such an honorable Bastard. Mark I will have to try Halverstam. I love all the other authors you listed. I just have not read him."
Renee,
David Halberstam is the best author I have ever read. Many of his books are on sports but always with
a social spin,race relations,(October 64) friendship, (Teammates) but he has also written the best book on Vietnam (The Best And The Brightest) Korea(The Coldest Winter) and one of his best is The Fifties, which explains a lot of things going on today. He has won numerous Pulitzers.
I just finished
. It was very good. It's the second book in a series, but you don't have to read the first book to enjoy this one. (In fact, I liked this more than the first one.)
I just finished LaBrava and was so impressed that I decided to read another book by Leonard, Get Shorty, which is proving to be a really good read as well.
Mikela wrote: "I just finished LaBrava and was so impressed that I decided to read another book by Leonard, Get Shorty, which is proving to be a really good read as well."If you decide to read one more from Leonard, try Killshot. It's my favorite of his.
One more done, 26 to go. Finished As The Pig Turns
and was busily congratulating myself that I'm all caught up on this author when I found out she has published not one, but two more Hamish MacBeth since last I checked. Sigh. This one wasn't bad. She's been phoning them in somewhat the last couple years but still highly readable.
Reading to The Man From Primrose Lane by James Renner, I really like it. Listening to Hold Tight by Harlan Coben, not his best.
Another one down. 25 to go. Finished Last Car To Elysian Fields
. James Lee Burke never disappoints.
In about six weeks I will publish the third in my Brad Frame Mystery series. It is called BLOOD PORN. Brad and his associate Sharon Porter are asked to help locate a young man missing from a juvenile institution. He was last seen in a web-based porn video, and their search leads them to the institution as the source for other performers in the illicit porn; the producers of the videos will stop at nothing to keep their identities a secret, including murder.I’m interested in finding mystery fans willing to read an advance PDF of the manuscript and possibly review the book. Just send me a message with your e-mail address and I will send you the file (BLOOD PORN is 298 pages).
NOTE: The premise of the series is that Brad Frame lived an unfocused life on Philadelphia’s Main Line until his mother and sister were murdered more than a dozen years ago. He got involved to solve their crime and then became a private detective to help bring justice to other people’s lives.
Brief synopsis of the other two books:
In UNFORGIVING SHADOWS, Brad is invited to the execution by lethal injection of one of the two men responsible for the kidnap and murder of his mother and sister. But the condemned man leaves behind a Bible for Brad with a message that suggests another person was involved in that heinous crime forcing Brad to revisit the decade old case.
In TRANSPLANTED DEATH, Brad is asked to investigate the mysterious deaths of transplant patients at a Philadelphia hospital. His mission is complicated by the fact that Philadelphia is under the worst snow emergency in a century, and the hospital administrators seem more concerned with positive PR than finding a serial killer in their midst.
Ray Flynt - ray@rayflynt.com
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Authors mentioned in this topic
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Heard Horowitz speak before he wrote his book on John Brown, he is interesting and the book on John Brown was excellent, forget the title right now (I'm old)
His wife is an excellent author as well, Geraldine Brooks.