Two Envelopes And A Phone > Recent Status Updates

Wondering how I’ll react to Spillane, so many years after reading I, The Jury. Anyway, a noir and hardboiled focus this Spring/Summer means I can’t ignore Spillane, despite the women in each of his books…

Read the Judith Merril tale, loved it. I met Judith Merril once; well, actually, I wandered into the Spaced Out Library as a youngster, and met “scary lady”. No, she was grand, but there was this kid wandering around her lovely books, and at some point she asked me what I was looking for. I wish I had said “fictional extrapolations of laser technology”, but I said “monsters”. First time I held Brown’s The Mind Thing.

Shall finish it tomorrow morning. It’s fun - all three of the books so far have been very similar, in a good way. Courtney from work says the ending of this one packs a jolt, and Book 4 is her favourite.

Courtney at work - who put me on to this series - would be disappointed if I didn’t return to it soon…so how about now! In truth, it’s fun, so I have no problem forging ahead with Lockwood & Co.; it’s just that there are so many tempting books for in between these ones. Meanwhile, I passed Pretty Little Dead Girls on to Courtney, and she loved it, and is passing it on to someone else in her life. Love that!

Nothing is blowing me away here, but she does write solid, entertaining ghost stories.

Absolutely loving this one. On top of that, reading a lot of noir and hardboiled in a condensed period of time - not something I have really done before - has made me appreciate this type of book more. The books don’t feel like odd stopovers in between many Golden Age-style whodunits; instead, it’s fun to make this my go-to Crime subgenre for months, and forget about country-house clue-fests for a while.

Haven't been dropped in a fictional swamp in a while.

I enjoy going back to this book from time to time. Next up is a chapter focusing on Patricia Highsmith; I also have a full Highsmith biography I intend to get to sometime this month.

Thrilled to be getting to my first read by Charles Williams.

Lots of interesting Horror reads lately, including this one from what I can tell so far.

Shall wrap this one up a little later - probably not one of his cleverest...but it has been a lot of fun.

I’m loving it, so let’s hope he sticks the landing.

Great opening premise - things so ugly, already.

I need just a quick detour away from noir and hardboiled novels - and yet, this is a great author to pick after a stellar Chandler book. Chandler (I think it was him) once sounded off with high praise for Freeman Wills Crofts (unless it wasn’t him; no, it was him; it was him, right?).

Not my usual fare - but I got steered to it by my SF fiction reading Lists and Guides.

Off and gumshoeing in fine style.