Guest Blog - Sorrow on Sunday by Ann Purser

For as long as I can remember Canadians have been paying quite a bit more for books than Americans have. If you look at the back of any paperback you will see what I mean. They are pre-priced and often the Canadian price is about three dollars more than the US one. During the past six months, the US dollar has lost its value internationally. At one point the Canadian dollar was on a par with the American dollar. When this happened, I asked the encyclopedia to whom I am married if this was affecting the cost of books in Canada at all. He told me that distributors were complaining about the price of books in Canada. If the dollar was on a par why should Canadians pay more for books?

During our recent stay the Canadian dollar was not par with the American but it was worth 90 American cents for a few days. Because of all of this, I was not totally surprised when I bought a paperback in Montreal that cost only C$7.50 when the American price was $6.99. The truth is I was delighted. I have always felt that publishers were really penalizing their Canadian audience.

The book I bought at the new lower pricing was Sorrow on Sunday by Ann Purser. It has been a long time since I have read one of her books. Of course it is a mystery. It is set in a small town in England and the heroine is a bright woman who is probably around forty. Purser started the series with Murder on Monday in which Lois Meade sets up her own business called New Brooms. She is an efficient and thorough house cleaner and soon discovers that she is just as good as a business woman. Because her job takes her in and out of local homes, the local police detective Hunter Cowgill decides that it is to his advantage to have Lois work with him on a few of his cases.

By Sorrow on Sunday Lois is a well established undercover agent for the police. However, she soon discovers that her work with Cowgill is no longer a secret when she becomes the target of a local crime syndicate. This mystery moves along at a good pace. It is uncomplicated and an easy and entertaining novel. I cannot decide whether I like Lois or not. She probably would have me totally intimidated if she and I were to meet. I am neither sassy nor outspoken.

Since Purser has made it all of the way through the week, her book that came out last November has a new theme, Warning at One. I’ll have to see if I can find it at my local library now that I am on my way back home.

Guest Blog – The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny

The end of the month is drawing near and soon I will be traveling again. Away from Montreal and the McGill library. Therefore I have been trying to read all of the Louise Penny books that I can before leaving. I just finished The Cruelest Month and liked it more than her other mysteries.

Penny’s characters are vivid and believable. They remind me of people that I know. Penny though gives us a brief look at their thoughts and secrets. In the third Three Pines mystery, Clara Morrow still is going unrecognized for her art. Gamache is still being attacked personally from within the Sûreté. This book will bring to close some of the problems that he faces from his own comrades in the police force. Jealousy and revenge are major themes throughout the book. Jealousy of other people’s success and of others’ personal peace and contentment with life.

In life it is often difficult for each of us to find joy in other people’s accomplishment and success. In many ways, I think that is a mark of true friendship. It is not so difficult to commiserate with a friend over the struggles and challenges of life. Too often we discover within ourselves the reluctance to find joy in someone else’s joy or abundance in her life.

Basically that is what this story is about: the husband who is afraid that his wife is more talented than he is, the friend who can’t understand how his life long friend could find such happiness and contentment, the friend who thinks that other people like someone better than themselves. All people that you and I know. Thank goodness Penny manages to have good triumph over evil by the conclusion of her stories. I never have liked those stories where the protagonist dies on the last page.

Guest Blog – Dead Cold by Louise Penny

I have read only two mysteries written by Penny, but already I am attached to her detective, Armand Gamache. In fact at the end of Dead Cold when I discovered that someone in the Sûreté is out to get Garmache, I was really alarmed and concerned for him. My concern was connected to the fact that it was apparent that this antagonism towards Gamache would continue into the next novel and perhaps the one after that.

Not too surprisingly Dead Cold takes place in the small village of Three Pines at Christmas. The cold atmosphere was so vivid that I decided that I never want to be in the Eastern Townships of Quebec in the winter. Well, let’s make that all of Quebec. I did spend a few days in Quebec City in November several years ago and for the first time in years bought a hat to try to protect my head and ears from the biting cold wind. I haven’t worn the hat again. There has not been a moment since then when I have been exposed to cold as bitter as on that snowless winter day in Quebec City.

In the novel, a woman is electrocuted while sitting by a frozen lake watching a curling match. The first mystery in the story was ‘how could this have happened?’ Despite the fact that it is a murder mystery, Penny had me laughing out loud while reading. I had to struggle to resist boring my husband with another really funny incident in the novel just as the police officer had to fight the urge to blow on his hands to warm them while sitting inside the very cold house of Ruth Zardo.

Dead Cold was amusing and at the same time sad. Not all of the characters I grew fond of while reading made it to the end of the novel. I hope that Louise Penny finds readership south of the border. She is well worth reading. I am grateful to a friend in the United States who suggested that I look for her books.

Guest Blog - Grave Secrets by Kathy Reichs

I learned about Kathy Reichs last summer while I was staying in Toronto and reading crime mysteries written by Canadian authors. I mistakenly thought that Reichs was one since she works out of Montreal as well as North Carolina. However, she is actually a native of Chicago and received her Ph.D. at Northwestern. However, her first book Déjà Dead won the Ellis Award for Best First Novel in 1997. The television series Bones is based on her novels. Although I have not actually watched one of the episodes, after reading Grave Secrets I have an incentive.

Grave Secrets is not centered around deaths in either Montreal or Raleigh. The main character and voice in Reichs' mysteries is Temperance Brennan who like Reichs is a forensic anthropologist. The story begins in Guatemala where Tempe is volunteering her time to help identify the remains of Mayan people who were killed during the civil war that lasted from 1962 to 1996. The remains of twenty-three women and children have been lying at the bottom of a well since 1982. Tempe and her team are there to retrieve the bones and identify them so that they can be properly buried by their families.

The mystery is intriguing and the story moves quickly. It never gets bogged down anywhere, but if you have too much imagination, the retrieval of a decomposed body from a septic tank may be too graphic. Since I am in Montreal at the moment, I was pleased that Brennan returns to Montreal for a part of the novel. It was fun to be able to recognize where her neighborhood is located and where the holding cells are.

I thoroughly enjoyed Reichs and am looking forward to reading other mysteries written by her. However, there was one aspect of the story that nagged at me. Throughout the book, Brennan asks herself again and again and again, “Will the killing never end?” She is so tired of death. I wanted very much to yell at her, “Get a grip, woman! If you are tired of dead bodies, change your profession!” I’ll let you know if in Reichs' later novels, Brennan is less likely to bemoan the fact that she is surrounded by dead bodies.

Guest Blog – Dragon Bones by Lisa See

Two years ago I read Flower Net, the first mystery by Lisa See. The protagonists are David Stark, an American attorney from San Francisco, and Liu Hulan, a top investigator in China’s security force. Liu is from a prominent family in Beijing but was actually educated in the United States. She and Stark first met when they were attorneys in the same firm in San Francisco.

In Dragon Bones the two are married and mourning the lose of their daughter who died from meningitis when she was three years old. Liu is dealing with the lose by isolating herself and seldom interacting with Stark. Liu’s old mentor Zai sends the two of them off to investigate the death of an American archeologist on the Yangzi River close to the Three Gorges. A huge dam is under construction that will flood the Three Gorges and displace millions of peasants. Archeologists are frantically digging and searching for artifacts before the dam is completed and the area is flooded permanently.

Dragon Bones was published in 2003 before the dam was completed. Needless to say one of my first breaks in reading was to look at the Three Gorges dam on the Internet. It was completed in part in 2006 but is not scheduled to be fully operational until 2011 . The dam was created to supply China with energy that is so badly needed as the country becomes an industrial nation.

The book is filled with discussions about Chinese history and folklore. If you are interested in the ancient history and folk tales of China, the book is filled with information. If you are a casual mystery reader like myself, you will need to be patient and determined to make it through the information. I have realized that I have only a very basic knowledge of the nation and know even less about China’s creation stories.

Overall I am glad that I read the book. I certainly have learned a lot more about China and its ancient civilizations. Part of the book involves the dead archeologist’s interest in the development of written language. I found this interesting since I was aware that all of the Asian languages with characters owe their roots to China. Japan although it has an ancient history had no written language until it started having commerce with China.

If you are looking for a good book about the early Chinese immigrants to the United States, I highly recommend See's book On Gold Mountain. I found the early history of See's ascendants fascinating. I came away from reading it with a much greater respect for those determined and hard working men who came to a hostile environment to help better the lives of their families in China.

Guest Blog – Still Life by Louise Penny

Canadian author Louise Penny is relatively new on the mystery writing scene. Her first book, Still Life published in 2005, won the New Blood Dagger in Britain and the Arthur Ellis Award in Canada for best first crime novel. Since then she has received more awards for her writing. Her novel, The Cruelest Month, won the Agatha Award..

It was by chance that I picked her first novel off the bookshelves at McGill’s library. It was a good introduction to her inspector, Armand Gamache of the Sûreté du Quebec and the small town of Three Pines.

Penny lives in a small town south of Montreal close to the US border. That is the setting of Three Pines. Still Life is a very comfortable cozy mystery and I enjoyed it very much. I decided early on who the murder was and was surprised when I discovered that I was wrong in the last few pages. Of course, if I had been thinking while I was reading, I would have seen the clues leading to the revelation of the killer. I am not sure whether Penny is available in the US. Probably not at my local library. I might have to try to read more of her novels in the next few weeks before I head back to the United States. I liked her inspector and I liked her character Clara Morrow in this first novel. When I read about Penny on the Internet I was delight to find that both Gamache and Clara appear in later books. Another good reason to read more Penny.

Guest Blog - The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency

If you have not had a chance to watch the new HBO television shows from Alexander McCall Smith's series of books about Precious Ramotswe and her friends, I hope you will put it on your list of DVDs to rent when they come out. Both my husband and I have enjoyed watching the unfolding tale of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. We look forward to Sunday night and are grateful that we can watch missed episodes on HBO On Demand.

This is such a great adaptation of the books. And if you have not discovered the books, I highly recommend that you read them. They are more than good mysteries, they are a gentle and frequently amusing look at the strengths and failings of man/womankind. Happy reading and watching!

Guest Blog – Nothing to Lose by Lee Child

Nothing to Lose was released in the paperback edition this spring. Child’s novels are usually around 400 pages long. This one had another one hundred. And I got bogged down in the middle. Probably largely motivated by the fact that my reading materials were limited, I slogged on.

The villain in this story is a man who owns the metal recycling plant in a small town called Despair in Colorado. Thurman not only owns the only place of employment but he owns his employees' homes as well. On top of that he is the local preacher at the only church in town. Thurman is a believer in the rapture and in Armageddon. As the story progresses, it becomes evident that he is a fanatic.

I am not exactly sure why I enjoyed Tripwire (see an earlier blog) so much and struggled through Nothing to Lose. Perhaps it was because in Tripwire, Child allows us to see what the antagonist is doing while Reacher is slowly gathering facts and information. I had a sense of two forces building and getting ready to collide at the end of the novel.

Nothing to Lose is well constructed but there was just something that rubbed against me. Perhaps it is the fact that although I don’t believe in ‘the rapture,’ I do believe in respecting other people’s religious beliefs. I am aware that there are extremists among all followers of religious or philosophical thought, but the small town in the middle of nowhere that was a fortress against the world did not sit well with me. I have never been a fan of the story where the stranger walks into a small town and discovers that the whole town is evil and out to get him. Nothing to Lose just didn’t work for me.

Guest Blog – A Murder of Quality by John le Carré

When I was a teenager, I saw The Spy Who Came in From the Cold with Richard Burton. I have not seen it since but I still remember Burton’s performance and the chilling ending. The book itself established le Carré as an author. Since then I have seen George Smiley played by Sir Alec Guinness on Masterpiece Theatre. He is quiet and unobtrusive with a very sharp mind. But I have never read any of le Carré’s books until now.

With small tight type, A Murder of Quality is only 150 pages long. When I picked the book up, I hoped that it would be a satisfying read. It didn’t disappoint me. It had a few conversations between its characters that left me feeling as if I was an uneducated participant on the sidelines. However, I am used to that from reading authors such as Dorothy Sayers. British authors of a certain period seem to have this desire to show off their education by quoting Latin or spouting intellectual piffle. 'Piffle,' by the way, is a good Lord Peter Wimsey word if I remember correctly.

I found the book interesting largely because the victim of the book is describe by various acquaintances in very different terms. Some say she was gauche, some say she was kind and went out of her way to help others. It isn’t until the end of the book that the reader discovers what Stella was really like. The discovery changes one’s perspective completely.

I don’t think that John le Carré is reading for everyone. Younger readers might find him stuffy and dismiss him. However, this is only his second novel. I am interested in reading something more recent. In the meantime, I thoroughly enjoyed A Murder of Quality. It was certainly a very nice and sophisticated break from reading Lee Child.

Guest Blog – Eyes of a Stranger by Rachel Ann Nunes

I have a friend who seems to read only fiction written by authors who are LDS. She reads mysteries. Obviously there is a market out there and my friend and co-worker helps support it. She frequently gives me books for my birthday or eagerly lends one to me saying, “This is so good. You’ll love it.” Being a loyal friend, I reluctantly accept her offerings. One of the more recent loans was Eyes of a Stranger.

Some of the authors I have read in this niche of books, are not much more skilled than a senior in high school. Rachel Ann Nunes is better than that. Her mystery takes place in Portland, Oregon and is centered around the destruction of the Hawthorne Bridge. It has never actually collapsed in "real life." It did burn down in 1902 and was replaced by the current lift bridge. The novel has romance and mystery. And a bit of a twist at the end.

I don’t think I am going to give up reading mass market paperbacks, but it was a pleasant excursion into a gentler area of fiction. By the way, this book has no references to religion. Possibly Nunes was hoping to bring in a wider readership.

Guest Blog – Tripwire by Lee Child

I keep telling myself that I am going to start reading best sellers, classics or something intellectually stimulating. So far it hasn’t happened. When I was looking for something to read on a cross country flight, I bought a Lee Child mystery/thriller. It took no time at all for me to become engrossed in Tripwire. In fact, I wanted life to quit getting in the way of reading.

Tripwire is a story that has its roots in the Vietnam conflict. Therefore the villain is from my generation. Every time that I read a Lee Child I feel certain that the next book cannot possibly have a bad guy worse than the one in the novel I am reading. Somehow though they always manage to horrify me with their evil deeds. Hobie in Tripwire is certainly no exception. He has a scarred face from severe burns and has lost his right hand. In place of the hand he has a hook that has a razor capability. He uses the hook to intimidate and injure people who get in his way.

It takes the entire novel for Reacher to come face to face with this evil man. And the ending is surprising. I will tell you that Reacher meets the love of his life and I am curious to know how and why he goes back to wandering the country leaving her behind. I guess I will have to check out the next book in the series, Running Blind.

Child is enthralling but he does have his flaws. Of course, this is not great literature, but that doesn’t bother me. This time he totally gets it wrong by saying that the guys going to Vietnam all wanted to be Frank Sinatra. I wonder how he got his timeline and wars so mixed up. Sinatra was the idol during WW II. Who do you suppose guys wanted to be in the late sixties? I have no idea. Certainly in Good Morning, Vietnam no Sinatra recordings were played.

Guest Blog - Shrink Rap by Robert B. Parker

I just finished my second book about Sunny Randall. This one was slower going for me. I actually did the laundry and loaded the dishwasher instead of throwing all responsibility aside to read the book.

In Shrink Rap, Sunny Randall is hired as an escort and bodyguard for a woman novelist who is being stalked by her ex-husband. Her ex turns out to be a psychiatrist who became her lover while she was still his patient. Sunny decides that she is going undercover to learn more about the stalker, John Melville, and ends up putting herself in peril in order to trap or entrap the "shrink."

There is not a lot of sexual detail. Parker stays true to his past form. However, as Sunny places herself in a situation where she may be "gang" rapped by men in monogrammed shirts and suits, I felt really uncomfortable. Parker was able to convey the concern that Sunny and her close friends feel as she contemplates putting herself at risk. But being a cynic, I could not help but wonder if there were men who read the end of the book and felt excited about the dramatic scene while I was feeling panicky despite knowing it was "only" a book. Fortunately, I will never know. I would hope that the male portion of the population felt sympathy for the victims. Overall there was just a little too much mental illness or just plain weirdness in this novel for my liking.

Guest Blog- Perish Twice by Robert B. Parker

I had no trouble finding some of Parker's novels about Sunny Randall. And no trouble getting lost in the pages and finishing the book in a very short time. In this story, Sunny's sister comes to her to have her shadow her husband to find out if he is cheating on her. Sunny's best friend is bored with her marriage and having an affair. Sunny herself is recently divorced but keeps on seeing her ex-husband Richie. A powerful women's rights advocat comes to Sunny because she is being stalked by a man who talks about "slapping bitches." Soon someone turns up dead.

I am not sure that Sunny sounds very different from Jesse Stone. I am not totally sure that she really has a woman's voice, but she is enjoyable and the book was absorbing. This particular book had just about every type of sexual relationship that women have except a healthy marriage. The relationships ran the gamut from prostitution to unhappy marriage and lesbian commitment.

Like the Jesse Stone books there is just a sprinkling of rough language and sexual relationships are conducted off the page. I like both of these factors. In Perish Twice, Sunny ably solves the mystery. And I am ready to try another book featuring this feisty female detective.

Guest Blog - Die Trying

I really did not plan to stay awake half the night finishing Lee Child’s Die Trying. If my husband was not out of town, I am sure I would have been sensible and would have closed the book with 200 pages left to read instead of reading all of the way to the end. By the way, I am handicapped by being a very slow reader.

Ironically I got halfway through the book and wondered whether I really wanted to read it all or just skip to the last pages. The story is about the kidnapping of an FBI agent in Chicago. Jack Reacher is in the wrong place at the wrong time and he gets picked up and pushed into the car with Holly Johnson. So many of their attempts to escape fail and when they finally do escape but are quickly recaptured, I was about to give up on the novel. If I had, I would have missed out on a lot of action and on Jack managing to outwit the head of the militia.

Just a few days ago I watched a repeat of NCIS where weapons stolen from the Marines were being bought illegally by a right wing militia group. The buyers drove up in their Humvees dressed in military uniforms. It took a moment for me to realize that these men in uniform were not a legitimate military group. It was easy to carry that image over to Die Trying. The kidnappers turn out to be a militia group that is determined to establish a new independent nation within the United States with a government like the Founding Fathers intended.

At over 400 pages of small print, Lee Child is not a fast read for me, but I keep going back to read about this loner’s action-packed adventures. I am learning a lot about military weapons. Since I am definitely a pacifist at heart, I am sure the knowledge will really pay off in the future.

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

Just a quick note. Thanks to my review reading children, I am aware that tonight HBO will air a pilot for The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith. Most of the media has good things to say about it and imdb.com already has a page about it. I am ready to enjoy the series and to be beguiled. See you tomorrow morning to see what you thought about it.

Guest Blog - Night and Day by Robert B. Parker

It feels as if I haven’t read anything in weeks. I have started several books and have not got beyond the beginning chapters. Then I got notification that the new Jesse Stone was available for me to pick up at the local library. I was caught from the first page and before I knew it I had finished Night and Day.

As usual, I could see the whole story played out with Tom Selleck as Jesse Stone. And I could hear his voice with every line and I could see Kathy Baker and Kohl Sudduth as his two sidekicks. For some reason on the TV series Molly played by Viola Davis has morphed into Rose. She is still Molly in the books but I now have Baker in my head.

Will I spoil the story for you if I tell you that this is not a story about a murder investigation? Instead it is a tale of obsession. Obsession on many levels afflicting various people and destroying their lives or preventing them from moving forward with their lives. It is a good story and a quick and enjoyable read.

Sunny Randall is back in this Jesse Stone story. I like her. She too has an obsession with her ex that is keeping her from moving on. While browsing, I discovered that Robert B. Parker has several books that are about her. I will have to check the library and find out if any of the books featuring Randal are carried there. I have never got into the “Spenser for Hire” ones, but I would like to read about her. I wonder if Jesse Stone shows up in the pages.

So if you have run into a reading block, I recommend this new one by Parker. He might get you past the beginnings of the best sellers or biographies that you have been trying to read and back into the middle of a book.

Guest Blog - Killing a Unicorn

I spent last week visiting three of my granddaughters. The youngest who is not quite three years old had me read some witch stories again and again. I don’t remember being attracted to witch stories when I was little. However, I did notice that at the end of all of the tales, the wicked witch received a just punishment. Maybe Camille’s enjoyment of reading witch stories gives her the same reassurance that justice can prevail as a good mystery with a satisfactory ending brings to me.

I did find time to read Killing a Unicorn by Marjorie Eccles on my trip. I still have not read any of Eccles’ books about Gil Mayo. Killing a Unicorn is a cozy murder mystery where it doesn’t take long for the police to realize that the murder of Bibi must have been committed by someone in the family.

The story was satisfactorily interesting and so were the characters, but I did not feel comfortable with the author’s shifts from past tense to present tense throughout the story. “Forty minutes later, Fran steps off the train...” just does not feel comfortable to me as a reader. The use of the present tense did not give me any sense of being right there in the action of the story. The words were still there on the page that was apparently printed in 2002.

Other than that quirk of the author, it was an enjoyable novel with a few twists that I did not expect. The wicked were punished and the innocent resolved their problems. A comfortable ending.

However, I never quite understood the title of the novel either. I have always associated the killing of a unicorn to an act of wanton violence. The dead woman in the story does not turn out to be the kind and caring person that she seemed at first glance. Definitely not a person who is gentle and good like a unicorn or without enemies.

Guest Blog - The Unexpected Guest

The Unexpected Guest is the adaptation of an Agatha Christie stage play by Charles Osborne. According to an afterword by Osborne, the play was written in four weeks by Christie. It opened in Bristol in 1958 and played successfully in London for 18 months. The adaptation by Osborne was copyrighted in 1999.

I was hoping for another Agatha Christie novel. The Unexpected Guest does not fulfill that wish. It reads very much like a stage play despite the fact that Mr. Osborne takes some of the action outdoors. Like a good Christie work there is no unnecessary conversation. All of the information you are given leads to the solution of the mystery. However, the solution became apparent to me early on in the story. Have I read her mysteries too often? Is it the fact that I am an older reader? I am not sure if someone less aware of Christie’s stories would be deceived or not.

I won’t spoil the ending, but I would love to hear if anyone else was unsurprised by the conclusion. Do not read Wikipedia's information on the book because it gives away the ending. By the way, Charles Osborne seems to be a bit of a mystery man himself. The internet does not seem to have the final word on him. In a site mentioning that he has written several books about music, it makes no mention of his adapting several Christie plays into novels. The best information I could find on him was inside the back cover of the paperback I just read.

Guest Blog - The Camomile Lawn

I am so glad that the Bookrater’s blog is subtitled “or what I'm reading now.” I am not reading anything intellectual. In fact it was several years ago that I read The Camomile Lawn by Mary Wesley. However, I came across the DVD of the novel the other day at the library and just had to check it out. Needless to say, there was way too much sex for my taste when I read the book. I should not have been surprised that the televised version was the same. I think I saw more nudity in this series than I have ever encountered before. Perhaps that is partly due to the fact that it was a mini series produced in the UK with five episodes. But I kept on watching even though I resorted to fast forwarding through a few conversations between individuals in their all together.

I was attracted to the novel in the first place because it is the story of an English family. The story covers the summer of 1939 and continues into the years that Britain was at war. All of the young people who are carefree while visiting their Aunt Helena in Cornwall with the lawn planted in camomile find themselves dealing with the world as it changes when their nation goes to war. Of course all of the young men join the military. One of the girls goes to work for the war office.

This looked like my type of book until I got into it a bit. I did not read about Mary Wesley until I watched the DVD this past week though. She was born in 1912 but did not have her first adult novel published until she was 71 years old. Over the next twenty years she had several best sellers. I noticed that the Sunday Times obituary writer seemed to be sympathetic with my view of her novel. “But the vast amount of time her characters spend thinking about bedroom matters was, perhaps, both her selling point and her one shortcoming as a writer. Occasionally, one could not escape the suspicion that she was going out of her way intentionally to shock.”

By the end of The Camomile Lawn I had come to the conclusion that not one person in her novel had any sense of sexual morality. The uncle put his hands up the skirts of little girls, the young adults slept with everyone they met and even the ten year old in the story confesses at a funeral forty some years later that her first sexual encounter was with a family friend who was about forty years her senior.

In a depressed mood, I picked up D.E. Stevenson’s novel about post WW II at the library. Mrs. Tim Gets a Job is the story of an army wife who decides to get a job while her husband is stationed in Egypt and her two children are away at school. Hester ends up assisting the owner of a bed and breakfast in Scotland. On one occasion Mrs. Tim and Erica discuss the behavior of a Mrs. Ovens whose husband is still posted aboard in the military.

“About that lady.”
“Nasty piece of work!”
”Erica,” I say in a lower voice, “There’s something odd going on between her and Mr. Wick. Perhaps I should have told you before but...”
“Something odd!” exclaims Erica fiercely, “What a way to talk! I hate mimsey-mouthed people - why can’t you call a spade a spade!”
I am so roused by the accusation of euphemisms that I tell Erica in Elizabethan language exactly what I suspect (Stevenson, p 138-9).

This exchange recorded by Stevenson is exactly my kind of reference to sexual encounters on the page. She left no doubt of what was going on and left me chuckling over their conversation.
Undoubtedly because of authors like Wesley, I keep on reading mysteries. Even with mysteries I prefer discreet references to the characters' love lives and sketchy information about violence. There is a long list of best sellers by Mary Wesley but I don’t think I am going to be checking them out at the library or looking for them on Amazon.com.

Guest blog - Reflex by Dick Francis

I thought that I had read all of the mysteries written by Dick Francis. However, I picked up a novel at the local thrift store for only 50 cents and soon discovered that it was a new story to me.

Reflex has all of the elements of a Francis novel. Philip Nore is a jump jockey as Francis was in his own life. That makes him medium height but still constantly watching his weight so that he is not too heavy to ride. Steeplechase jockeys ride on courses about two miles long and encounter ditches, fences and hedges along the way. In all of the Francis novels I have read, steeplechasing is described as a dangerous sport. It is not uncommon for rider and horse to come down after misjudging a gate and subsequently be trodden on by the horses following. This by itself makes for a tough hero well acquainted with pain. Usually in a Dick Francis mystery the ability to endure pain pays off because each hero is at some point beaten by the bad guys. However, unlike a few writers I have read, Francis always has a satisfactory ending. And I am definitely addicted to the just if not legal ending for a mystery.

In this story the death of a photographer happens before the story opens. It is not until you are well into the novel that it becomes apparent that the death was not an accident. Philip Nore becomes entangled in clues left behind by the photographer and soon finds himself in danger. Of course, there is a sprinkling of romance as well. This is an older novel written when I think that Francis was at the height of his career. Definitely an enjoyable tale.

Guest blog – 13 For Luck

A few evenings ago, I found myself waiting for my husband who was in a meeting. Reading a collection of thirteen short stories by Agatha Christie was the perfect way to pass the time. My battered paperback copy of 13 For Luck was published by Dell in 1968. The spine says that it sold for 50 cents. It is probably still available at your local library or perhaps at a used book store. I think that it is only available as a used book. Agatha Christie’s books featuring Poirot or Miss Marple keep turning up in new publications at the local bookstore. However, this group of stories features problem solvers that many Christie fans might not have heard about before.

Not too surprisingly there are 13 stories in this collection. Several of them feature Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. Tuppence and Tommy Beresford have one story while Christopher Parker Pyne and the invisible Mr. Harley Quin have two each. Inspector Evans seems to have appeared in one short story only.

I think this is a great little collection of stories. Each detective is introduced in a short paragraph or two on the page before the first story. In about 20 pages each of the mysteries is presented and resolved by one of Christie’s brilliant solvers. Good short mysteries and perfect for sitting in the doctor’s office or waiting for half an hour for someone to finish a meeting. However, be forewarned, once you have read one, you will want to finish all of the stories. And probably go check out an Agatha Christie that you haven’t read for a few years. I recommend the Tommy and Tuppence stories. They haven’t been on television recently so they might feel completely new even to an old fan like me.

The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Oscar is overweight, a sci-fi aficionado, and a sucker for beautiful—and not so beautiful—women. Not too surprisingly, he lacks the “mojo” emanating from all his Dominican relatives and neighbors and suffers because of his quirks.

Oscar's ups and downs are detailed in Junot Diaz's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The novel jumps between Oscar's life and those of his older sister, Lola, and mother, Beli. Though they live in New Jersey, their fates are inextricably tied to the Dominican Republic and their ancestors there.

I was not overly drawn to or sympathetic with either Oscar or Beli. The only family member I truly cared about, was interested in, and related to was Lola, a loyal, loving, and patient sister.

In fact, perhaps the most intriguing and involving character in the novel is the Dominican Republic itself. Using mostly footnotes, Diaz explains the tragic politics in the DR's not-so-distant past. To my shame, I knew very little, if anything, about the area and had never even heard of the despot Trujillo before reading the novel. Oscar Wao gives an enlightening yet entertaining education on DR history and left me with a desire to research (and verify) more about these historical events.

Diaz has a casual writing style. The narrator relates Oscar's tale in a conversational, and thus often vulgar, tone. I found the storytelling comfortable and inviting (like listening to one of my male colleagues), but some readers may be turned off by a free use of profanity and sexuality.

Oscar Wao is an absorbing novel. Though I certainly would not have declared it the best book of the year, it is a good read for anyone interested in contemporary literature or Caribbean history.

Guest Blog - Bad Luck and Trouble

In Bad Luck and Trouble, it is through a deposit into his bank account that Jack Reacher finds out that one of his ex-army colleagues wants to speak to him. When he meets with Neagley, he discovers that one of the special team of investigators that they belonged to has been murdered. Together with two other former MPs, Reacher and Neagley set out to discover who was responsible for their friend’s horrible death. Unfortunately, they discover that he was not alone. In fact, he was not the first of their friends to be thrown alive out of a helicopter at 3000 feet.

In the end, the four friends discover the treachery that led to the deaths of their old friends. The build up to the story seemed a bit slow to me, but the novel has a fast action and violent finish. When Reacher meets up with the men who killed his friends, he discovers that revenge holds little satisfaction. There is no way to compensate for the loss of those you love. Nothing can bring them back.

Despite the fact that Reacher regrets the passage of time without seeing his old friends, it seems likely that he is not going to schedule time with his remaining friends any time soon. I wonder where Lee Child will place him in his next novel.

Guest Blog - One Shot

Lee Child does not write cozy English mysteries and Jack Reacher is not a conventional hero. He is an ex-military police officer who has left the army and convention behind. After living a life regulated by Army rules, Reacher has chosen a life of wandering. He not only doesn’t own a home, he doesn’t own a suitcase. When the clothes he is wearing become dirty or torn, he simply purchases new ones and discards the old. He puts his clothes under the mattress at night so that they will look pressed in the morning.

This unconventional hero does have qualities that make him larger than life. He is a smart and meticulous investigator. He has an uncanny sense of survival. Despite the clothes under the mattress and the disposable razors, Reacher has appeal.

One Shot begins with a sniper shooting five people as they leave their office building after work. Everything leads the investigators to a former US Army sniper. When arrested, James Barr says little in his defense. He asks the DA to “Get Reacher for me.” In Miami Reacher hears about the slayings and immediately gets on a bus headed for Indiana and what looks like an open and shut case.

I could hardly put down the book. Life just kept getting in the way of reading the next chapter. Now that I have finished the book, I am not really sure whether Child is a good writer or not. Was it just the action? Was it the plot? Was I attracted to the characters? It is pretty obvious that no one from this novel is going to make it into the next book I read by Child. After all, Reacher just got on another bus and headed for a different city.

One Shot had a very satisfying if violent ending. Reacher found the bad guys and rescued the innocent victims. There was a sense of justice that brought me satisfaction. I am looking forward to reading another of his mysteries and meeting Jack Reacher again. Even if he is wearing the same clothes he had on three days ago.

Guest Blog – Death Cap by June Thomson

During the extremely icy and snowy first weeks of this month, I returned all of my library books and did not check out any others. Because of that I had to resort to going through the old paperbacks around my house. When I do that, I frequently find books I have read before but can remember nothing about. This time I picked up an unknown author, June Thomson. Thanks to the internet I have been able to discover that she was born in 1930 and published a new novel as recently as 2006. Death Cap was her second mystery and it was published in 1971. As I was browsing the Internet, I kept coming across information saying that she has written mystery novels about Sergeant Tom Boyce and Detective Chief Inspector Jack Finch. Well, DCI Finch did not feature in the novel that I read but Death Cap was there clustered among those with presumably these two leading characters. Finally I came across a site that explained the conflict. Apparently for some reason Finch became Rudd in the novels when they were published in the United States. At the time the novels flew across the Atlantic, was Jack Finch a well known name in other circles? I don’t know.

Death Cap typifies the cozy English novel. It has all of the elements of a good “home by the winter fire” read. Small town. Just a handful of suspects. In fact I have realized that there is very little difference between a cozy mystery written in 1971 versus one written in 1931. Technology had yet to burst upon the scene. Is it the 1990s before DNA testing and computers and cell phones changed how every mystery would be written? I love mysteries but am not an expert in the genre. Even at that, do you realize that 1990 was almost 20 years ago? I think that mysteries will never be written the same as the days when Dorothy Sayers and Agatha Christie were writing.

Death Cap is the investigation into a seemingly accidental death from eating a poisonous fungus mixed in with mushrooms. The tedious police procedural is well defined. It becomes apparent that it was no accident that the amanita phalloides found its way into the farmer’s field of mushrooms, but is there any way to discover who is responsible for putting them there or of finding enough evidence to arrest that person? That is the real mystery in this novel. Thomson manages to produce a very satisfying ending to this bucolic puzzle.

Although there were times when I felt that the novel was moving slowly, I will be checking to see if some of Thomson’s more recent mysteries are in my local library. I will also be interested to find out whether it is Finch or Rudd who is the DCI.

Guest Blog - Dewey

At first glance Dewey may appear to be a book that only cat lovers and owners would enjoy. However, the book is more than the biography of an orange cat who came to live in the library. Vicki Myron with Bret Witter also tells the story of her own life with its many challenges and successes. Besides her story and Dewey’s, she relates the struggles of small towns and family farmers in the Midwest.

On a cold morning in January 1988, Myron and a co-worker found an abandoned kitten in the metal book drop box of their library in Spencer, Iowa. He was a fragile little animal with frost bitten paws and so filthy they had no idea that he was a long haired marmalade cat. The staff of the library decided to keep this tiny stray and soon called him Dewey (as in the library numbering system) Readmore Books. It also is a good question for a librarian to ask.

Since the Blogger happens to be a librarian, I found it interesting to read about Myron’s own journey to become a librarian and to read about her strong feelings about what role a library should play in a community. For example, she told about a neighboring town whose library loaned cake pans in different shapes and forms. You could check out a pan that looked like Garfield or a school bus, I suppose. Dewey himself turned out to be a draw that brought people who had never visited into the library. In fact he turned into a national celebrity.

Even though I knew the outcome of this story (after all cats rarely live to be twenty), I enjoyed following Dewey’s and Myron’s progress through the years. I also appreciated the intimate look at the demise of farms, small schools and even small towns as the nation moved from a rural society to an urban one. I have traveled past cornfields and sunflowers for as far as the eye can see while crossing our nation by automobile, but I have never got out to really look at the corn. Myron says it grows to be ten feet tall in Iowa.

By the way, we happen to have two cats. One we rescued from a shelter. The other is a throw away cat that no one wanted. They have very different personalities. One is a bully who nips at me. The other is a snuggler who touches his nose to mine. Dewey reminded me a lot of the cats I have known in my life. Thank goodness none of them had an addiction to eating rubber bands as Dewey did. You’ll have to read this feel good book to discover more about him. This is not a classic but I think you might enjoy it.

Guest Blog – Secret Santa: A Novel

About two years ago I read several Christmas stories. I read John Grisham’s Skipping Christmas, David Baldacci’s The Christmas Train and Robert Tate Miller’s and Beth Polson’s Secret Santa: A Novel. By far the story that I most enjoyed was Secret Santa. It is the story of a young reporter who constantly ends up doing the fluff pieces for the newspaper. More than anything Rebecca Chandler wants to be taken seriously as an investigative reporter. When her dreams of the future and for Christmas fall through, she sets out to prove that she can unearth the truth behind a small town’s secret Santa. Every Christmas for several years someone has given a much needed gift to a town resident during the holiday season.

As Rebecca tries to unearth the identity of the town’s benefactor, she falls under the spell of the little community and the kind people who live there. I will not be a spoiler and tell you how the story ends. That is part of the mystery. As I read the novel, I felt certain that eventually she would find out who the generous individual was, but the question was what would she do with that knowledge. I will just tell you that Miller and Polson do not disappoint. They keep the Christmas magic going until the last page.

I recently had the chance to see the television production of Secret Santa and was not disappointed. On imdb.com the only review said that it was apparent who the Secret Santa was early in the show. I did not have the same experience reading the book. The end was a delightful surprise.

Now that Christmas is over, I guess I will have to put my decorations and seasonal story books back into their boxes. I feel a little sad about doing so. There is nothing I enjoy much more than a good holiday story. Now where did I put that mystery I put aside at the beginning of December?

Guest Blog – A Christmas Dress for Ellen

Along with the Christmas decorations stored in the basement, I have a basket full of favorite Christmas books. One that I recently acquired is A Christmas Dress for Ellen. This is a charming story retold by Thomas S. Monson who is now the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The story is about the Jeppson family living in Southern Alberta in 1927. After two years of failed crops, the family is facing not only a bleak Christmas but a cold hard winter with little fuel or food to feed the family. The miracle occurs when a courageous mail carrier braves a winter storm to travel to the tiny town of Hillspring to deliver presents to the forlorn family.

It is a good Christmas story but a great deal of its appeal for me is that my father, Bob Fisher, was born and raised in Hill Spring, Alberta. In a small self-published book, Reflections at Christmas, my father told a couple of Christmas stories that tell about the perils of winter in Southern Alberta. One of the stories is similar to the one told by President Monson. In the Fisher story a neighbor comes to the rescue and battles his way through the snow to deliver the family’s Christmas package on the eve of that important day. Without his valiant efforts, the stockings of all the children would have been empty when they woke in the morning.

Another winter tale that Bob tells is about his father Peirce Fisher traveling by horse drawn sleigh in a storm that became increasingly severe. On the Blood Reservation he had to cross a gully that had only one bridge spanning it. As weariness settled in, Peirce walked more slowly with every step. Finally he gave in to the bone tiredness that he felt and leaned against his horse and fell asleep. Out of the blizzard a voice spoke to him, “Wake up, Wake up. You die.” This Indian angel who came in answer to Pierce’s prayer led him across the bridge. With his help, the horse and Grandpa Fisher made it home safely. For years afterward, Peirce looked into the face of every Blood tribe member that he saw, but he never recognized his savior from that winter night. However, he always treated each person with kindness and consideration.

I love the tales of Christmas miracles and of people’s kindness towards each other. This season leaves me with the desire to keep a bit of Christmas with me all through the year. And like my grandfather treat each person I meet with dignity and kindness. May this holiday season leave you with a touch of the season’s magic and kindness.

Guest Blog – Touching Spirit Bear

Once in awhile I am ready to take a break from mystery novels, so when this book was recommended to me, I thought I would read it. After all I have been reading all of the James D. Doss books at the local library featuring Charlie Moon who is a Ute.

If I had a young son who was struggling to read, Touching Spirit Bear by Ben Mikaelsen is a story that I would urge him to try. The novel is about Cole Matthews who is a 15 year old juvenile offender. Cole has always been in trouble and has always been angry. When a fellow classmate reports to the police that Cole has bragged about a break-in and robbery, Cole seeks revenge on the tattle tale. He attacks Peter and in his rage beats Peter’s head against the sidewalk. Only the interference of someone else prevents him from actually beating Peter to death.

While awaiting trial, Cole is assigned to Garvey a Tlingit tribe parole officer. It is likely that Cole with his long record of violence and larceny will be tried as an adult. Garvey intervenes and believing that the smooth talking Cole might actually be ready to change his life, recommends Cole for Circle Justice. Circle Justice is a community effort to rehabilitate offenders. The process of this system is a bit on the long side in Mikaelsen’s novel but it does give crucial background for the story. We discover that Cole has been beaten and neglected by his alcoholic father with the quiet acquiescence of his submissive drinking mother. He sees his world as a place where the only control he can have is through intimidation of others.

After months of waiting, the Circle of Justice determines that it will allow Cole to participate in their plan for healing his anger and abusiveness. He is to spend a year alone on an island just off the coast of Alaska. Shortly after arriving there, Cole sees the large white bear known as the Spirit Bear. In his anger and rage, Cole attacks the bear. Of course, the bear in defense of himself lashes out. For several days, Cole lies in the continuous rain with broken ribs and pelvis and multiple fractures in his right arm. Mosquitoes prey upon the torn flesh in his chest and rodents and seagulls come to participate in the feast. Broken and fragile, Cole struggles to remain alive despite his injuries.

The attack by the Spirit Bear happens early in the novel. The story is about Cole’s gradual acceptance of responsibility for his behavior and the slow process of healing and finding hope. Mikaelsen is able to make the angry and defiant Cole very real without resorting to using the kind of language that as a reader I have no doubt that he used. There is a sense of hope to the story despite the fact that the author makes it very clear that cycles of abuse are often passed from one generation to another. The abuse affects all of the community and there are no simple answers for healing violent and broken souls or healing the neighborhoods they have affected. Definitely a worthwhile read for the young reader and for adults.

Guest Blog - Death's Half Acre

Since I started reading the Hardy Boys and the Dana Girls mysteries when I was about 11 years old, I have been hooked on the genre. Christmas stories of any type always appeal to me. The first Margaret Maron novel that I read was a Sigrid Harald story, Corpus Christmas. Harald is a New York City police officer. I liked Harald and tried to find more novels about her. However, when I first saw Bootlegger’s Daughter about Deborah Knott living in North Carolina, I was not really interested. An attorney in a small town in North Carolina. Hmmm. I am both a Westerner and a Northerner. Was I interested in reading about someone in the rural south? Finally I gave in and read the first of many Deborah Knott mysteries.

I just finished Death’s Half Acre, the latest of Maron’s books about Judge Knott. As I read it I realized that it might be difficult to read this book without some background on the Knott family despite the fact that a family tree has been included at the front of this book; however, I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the latest antics in the lives of Deborah’s huge extended family. I noticed that on her website Maron expresses concern about new readers picking up a book in the middle of the series. Maron’s books are always populated with interesting characters. This book is no exception. In fact at times, I wondered whether I could keep up with all of the characters in the novel. Would I recognize the murderer when I got to the last chapter? Maron played the game entirely straight. I had all of the information in front of me and I still did not know who it was who shot Deborah in the arm in one of the final chapters. When all was disclosed, all I could say was, “Why didn’t I see this?”

Needless to say, I am looking forward to reading Maron's new book Sand Shark in 2009.

Guest Blog - Jon Scieszka

As a grandmother, I am interested in children’s books. However, there are so many books out there that it is hard to know what would be an appropriate and enjoyable book for my grandchildren. I am always open to recommendations. When I heard about Jon Scieszka on NPR, I decided that I would check him out. I visited the library and literally checked out three books by Scieszka to read. I spent a happy hour or so reading children’s books but am still undecided about whether to invest in some of his books for my children’s children. I am not an expert on what appeals to children or what is appropriate.

Jon Scieszka was recently named the National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature by the Library of Congress. Be sure to click on the author’s name above and read more about this interesting man. There is an interview with Martha Stewart on his site as well. He has actually been publishing books for the last twenty years but this is the first time that I have read any of his work. By the way, twenty years ago I had a preschooler.

His first book was The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! The story is narrated by A. Wolf who claims that he was framed for the accidental deaths of two of the little pigs. It is a fun revisit to the age old morality tale of the need to be a hard worker who builds a brick house instead of going for the easy job with lots of time to play. Incidentally, although I chuckled, my sympathy for Alexander T. Wolf never did overshadow my concern for the pigs. There is also a 10th Anniversary Update available with a further message from the incarcerated A. Wolf. The illustrations by Lane Smith are colorful and imaginative.

The other picture book I checked out is The Frog Prince Continued. As in so many relationships, the Frog Prince and the Princess are not living happily ever after but are struggling to get along. He gets on her nerves a lot, in fact a whole lot. Finally the Frog Prince decides that he is going to find a witch who can turn him back into a frog. He encounters several fairy tale witches along the way. Most of them are much too scary for the Frog Prince or a little reader to linger with for long. I really liked the paintings of Steve Johnson and I am sure that my granddaughters would love the prince's encounters with familiar fairy tales. And possibly they will enjoy the surprise ending more than I did. I was definitely taken by surprise. Apparently I have little or no imagination.

Jon Scieszka has plenty of imagination. He has a whole series of books for young readers about the Time Warp Trio. Three boys from Brooklyn travel back in time to visit many historical events and sites. The book I chose to read is called Da Wild Da Crazy Da Vinci. Fred, Sam and Jo with the aid of their magical book travel back to visit Leonardo when he was employed by Borgia to create military machinery. He is working on a tank when they come upon him. They encounter not only Borgia but also Machiavelli and a Captain Nassti. This series undoubtedly serves as a doorway into a world of history that children might otherwise ignore. I have just to check out whether there was really anyone named Nassti in Leonardo’s world. By the way, my local library had a great many of these books available if your reader should get interested in them.

Scieszka has a new series that is out about Trucktown. Smash Crash has been on the New York Times best seller list for several months. It was not available at the library so I might have to go browse at Barnes and Noble. It is for preschoolers and is based on four year olds of Scieszka’s acquaintance. Scieszka’s message to parents and children is to open your mind about the many options for reading. He says that television and the computer all play a role in helping children acquire the skill needed to read. If you click on some of the highlighted words you will discover some of his computer pages for books including guysread.com. And parents, set a good example. Read yourselves. Especially fathers. Have a home with books of all sorts “just lying around.”

Happy reading and good luck on your book selections this holiday season.

Guest Blog - Don't Know Much About the Pilgrims

Next Thursday on November 27th, Americans will celebrate Thanksgiving. For most Americans it is a time to gather with family and friends and to take a moment to express appreciation for all that they have. Usually they will eat a turkey dinner with all of the side dishes that go with it and watch football on television. Although President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Thursday of November, it was not until 1941 that Congress declared a national holiday to give thanks setting the holiday as the fourth Thursday in November.

The first Thanksgiving was a feast that both Indians/Native Americans and the Puritans shared. Most of us have some vague memories from elementary school of learning about the Pilgrims and of how the Indians brought them food and taught them how to grow crops in their new home. If you would like a refresher course, Kenneth C. Davis has a children’s book out called Don’t Know Much About the Pilgrims. It is a very painless way for children and the adults in their lives to learn more about the Puritans and their early struggles to settle in New England. The book answers questions about what the Pilgrims wore, how they built their houses and where they worshipped. In fact it answers the question of how the Puritans became called the Pilgrims. There are bright and entertaining illustrations by S.D. Schindler to spark the imagination. In fact I learned a lot that I had not known about those first few years in Massachusetts.

I felt really confident about all of the information that the author shared until I came to the end of the book. On page 44 Davis says, “Today about one in every six Americans has a relative who came over on the Mayflower.” In my own family tree I am aware of Swiss Mennonites who came to the United States in about 1720. My husband has relatives that can be traced back to Tennessee in the early 1800s. Some how though I don’t think either of us had an ancestor on the Mayflower and I suspect that there are millions of Americans today whose families came to the shores of North America long after the Pilgrims. I wonder if this is a typo or if Mr. Davis just needs to check his statistics one more time.

In any case, this was a fun read and a good reminder that we have much to be grateful for. We in the US will miss the Blogger this Thanksgiving. I understand that she will be teaching classes in Turkey next Thursday.

Guest Blog - Dead Soul

About twenty-five years ago, I took a university class on adolescent literature. I read a lot of books that I enjoyed but I never liked reading fantasy or science fiction. Two books that we were assigned to read were Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time and Natalie Babbitt’s Tuck Everlasting. My professor kept encouraging me to read more fantasy. She was convinced that I would enjoy it. Needless to say, I never did become “hooked” on fantasy novels for adolescents or adults.

My indifference to fantasy has led me to wonder why I find James D. Doss’ mysteries intriguing and enjoyable. I recently finished Dead Soul and felt even more wrapped in the mystiscism in this Charlie Moon mystery.

In this mystery Aunt Daisy sees a young red headed woman on two separate occasions. Both times she realizes that the woman wants to talk to Charlie about something. Both times she is told by the woman that she can be found in an abandoned mining town in an arroyo. When the local police check it out, the two officers find no one living in the arroyo and they hastily leave the abandoned mining camp without acknowledging to each other that something there does not feel right.

In the meantime Charlie has been asked to look into the unsolved death of a Ute tribesman, Billy Smoke. Billy was acting as a chauffeur for a U.S. Senator. One night while waiting in a parking lot for the senator, he was bludgeoned to death. Shortly after he was killed, the senator approached the car and was attacked and left crippled as a result of his beating.

As always Charlie is able to recognize the truth although it is buried between layers of deception. However, this novel more than any other that I have read by Doss has a haunting quality. In fact Charlie cannot sleep because of dreams of the missing red headed woman. Unfortunately Dead Soul is one of Doss’ earlier books. I have read some of his more recent novels and have not encountered quite the same otherworldly atmosphere in them. I am having feelings of regret that I may not find another novel with practical Charlie haunted by another dead soul. And this from someone who has always said, “I just don’t like fantasy.”

Guest Blog - I Feel Bad About My Neck

During this past week, I watched the movie All the President’s Men again. I am not sure how long it has been since I last watched it. I have seen all or part of it several times over the years. It is the intriguing story of two Washington Post reporters who uncover the fact that it is the president of the United States, Richard Nixon, who is behind the break-in of the Democratic headquarters located in the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C and the subsequent cover-up. The two well known reporters are Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward.

Since that last time that I watched the film, I have read a book by Nora Ephron entitled I Feel Bad About My Neck. The book is a collection of published newspaper articles and essays. Most of the them are entertaining. Some of them from the 1970s feel a little dated and I wondered why they were included in the collection. For the most part though, I thought it was a very amusing book and I could identify with many of her comments about aging...including feeling bad about my neck. I have never lived in New York but have lived in large cities and I especially enjoyed the glimpses into the life of a New Yorker - the life of a person who lives in her own neighborhood or village in the middle of a metropolis.

Frequently in her book, Ephron refers to her ex-husband. Since I have not been in the habit of reading Ephron’s articles in the media, I had to do a little research on the Internet to discover that Ephron’s ex is Carl Bernstein of Watergate fame. In fact she has two sons from that marriage. The marriage ended “acrimoniously” and was the basis for Ephron’s novel Heartburn.

Although I chuckled over the book, I soon found that the attraction I felt for much of her work was generational. My daughters did not share my enjoyment. I have since discovered that there are quite a few books and movies that strike a cord with one generation or the other but not with both. When I read Notebook, I commented that there was too much detail about the young lovers’ relationship. My daughter-in-law said that the story would have been good if they had just left out the part about the old couple. Fortunately there are so many books out there that I will never read even a small portion of them and there is surely something to delight and entertain anyone who takes the time to open a book.

By the way, I did come to the conclusion that the movie All the President’s Men is kinder to Woodward than to Bernstein. I wonder if their personalities were accurately portrayed.

Guest Blog - Silks

The latest novel by Dick Francis and his son Felix is called Silks. Geoffrey Mason, the protagonist of the story, is a barrister in successful chambers in London. He hopes that one day he will ‘take silk’ and become a Queen’s Counsel. In his free time he rides in horse races as an amateur jump jockey wearing jockey silks.

The story begins in November of 2008 as Mason is defending Julian Trent who is accused of beating a man and his family with a baseball bat. Although he is convicted, he is soon out of prison. The prosecution’s attorney is found to have been involved in jury tampering and a mistrial is called. None of the previous witnesses are willing to testify against Trent in a second trial. And before he knows it, Mason is confronted by Trent swinging his baseball bat.

When top jockey Scot Barlow is killed by a pitch fork belonging to another jockey Steve Mitchell, Mason starts getting mysterious telephone calls telling him to be a ‘good little lawyer’ and take the case and ensure that Mitchell is convicted.

The story revolves around Mason’s struggle to fight for justice against a back drop of violence and intimidation. Mason soon finds that not only is he being threatened but his father and a new love interest are also in danger.

I’ve been a Dick Francis fan for years and owe all of my knowledge of racing and particularly jump racing to reading his mysteries. I picked up the book ready to be entertained but I was really puzzled by the dating in this new novel. The book was released last spring but the story begins in November 2008 and ends in May 2009. Why was the story placed in the future? Not until the final chapter does the reader discover that the solution to the mystery centers on a historical event that we are all familiar with; therefore, the manipulation of time in the novel. The story had to take place in the future.

Francis father and son did not disappoint me. I liked the main character and although I soon realized that one piece of information was key to the solution, I still was surprised by the ending. I hope that there will be another Dick and Felix Francis again next spring.

Guest Blog - In a Dark, Dark Room

Now that Halloween is over, is it too late to share with you our family’s favorite scary children’s story book?

When my youngest daughter was about 7, she loved to read the stories again and again or have someone read them to her. In a Dark, Dark Room is actually An I Can Read Book, but children at that age still love to snuggle up and have a parent read.

The story we loved best was The Green Ribbon. It is the love story of Jenny who always wore a green ribbon around her neck and Alfred. They fall in love and eventually marry but Jenny frequently reminds Alfred that he cannot take the ribbon off her neck. When they grow old and Jenny is dying, she finally gives her consent to Alfred to remove the ribbon. I won’t spoil the ending for any of you who cannot guess what happens.

My daughter is now in her mid twenties and still likes to watch scary movies at any time of the year and enjoys the chill of visiting a good haunted house in October. If you have a little ghoul at your house, they might enjoy this collection of stories retold by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Dirk Zimmer who died this year on October 3rd.

By the way, I have never graduated from the I Can Read level of scary stories. I like a good cozy mystery rather than something that keeps me awake at night.

Guest Blog - Tony Hillerman

I just checked my email and found a note from the Blogger about the death of author Tony Hillerman. If you are a mystery reader and you have never read one of Hillerman's mysteries set on the Navajo reservation in the southwest, you have missed one of the joys of mystery reading. He also wrote an autobiography, Seldom Disappointed and added the commentary to a photographic memoir of WW II called Kilroy was Here. Hillerman Country: A Journey through the Southwest with Tony Hillerman is a great addition to your reading if you have never had an opportunity to travel through this area of the United States. This book seems to be out of print but by now you know that I think the library is a great resource.

I am sorry that there will never by a new Tony Hillerman to read, but I am so grateful that he left behind books that I will enjoy reading again and again.

Guest Blog - At Home in Mitford

About ten years ago, a friend loaned me a book to read saying, “I think you’ll really enjoy it.” For some reason I never got beyond about page three and regretfully returned the book to her without having read it. A few weeks ago while visiting my sister, she handed me the same book and said, “Read this one. I think you’ll really enjoy it.” This time I persevered and wasn’t surprised that I really did enjoy it.

At Home in Mitford by Jan Karon is the first in a series of books about Mitford and Father Timothy. It is the warm and often amusing story of a Episcopal priest who at the age of sixty finds himself falling in love with his new neighbor while he is at the same time developing diabetes and feeling the effects of working hard for years without ever taking a vacation or any kind of break from worrying about the parishioners whom he dearly loves.

The book if full of interesting characters with stories of their own, but none of them overshadows Father Tim. He is a refreshingly human pastor who has great faith in God and the belief that if you will come to Him, He will lead you in the path you ought to go. Although the story revolves around a religious man of great faith, I never felt that I was being preached to. I liked his simple message that we should be looking for the Lord “down here” instead of asking if he is “up there” and that we can always count on the Lord even if his servants sometimes fail us.

It took me awhile to get into the book but about halfway through I discovered that there were lots of chores I was willing to avoid in order to curl up and read. Just what I expect of a good book. I’ll be looking for the next book in the series when I go to the library again. Fortunately or unfortunately, I am so far behind the trend on this popular series that I'll have no competition in checking the books out.

Guest Blog – The Man Who Forgot How to Read

On June 16th, I posted a guest blog about Howard Engel’s novel Memory Book. It is a mystery that takes Engel’s fictional detective through a similar experience that he had in his own life. Benny Cooperman wakes up in a Toronto hospital with no idea how he got there. He discovers that he has alexia sine agraphia.

In his own life Howard Engel woke up on July 31, 2001 and gradually realized that he must have had a stroke. He calmly woke his sleeping son, Jacob, and together they went to the emergency room of the hospital where his diagnosis was confirmed. During his slow recovery from the stroke, Engel wrote Memory Book. The Man Who Forgot How to Read came later. In this short memoir, Engel details the slow adjustment of a man whose life and livelihood revolved around reading to a world where as he said the local newspaper looked like a “Serbo-Croation version of the Globe.” He could write but he could not read what he had written. Like Memory Book, the memoir has an afterword by Oliver Sacks, MD.

I found reading about Engel’s experience interesting not because I am interested in medical conditions but because I was interested in the author. In fact Engel covers much the same ground in his memoir as he did in the novel about Cooperman. Since both books were published Engel has a new book out called East of Suez. I am looking forward to reading it when it is published in the US.

Guest Blog - Emotional Arithmetic

Last spring while living in Toronto, I read two books by Matt Cohen: Emotional Arithmetic and Elizabeth and After. At that time the movie with Susan Sarandon had not yet been released on DVD. It came out this summer, but I was unable to find it at any local rental stores or online. Thanks to imbd.com I discovered that for some reason when the DVD was released, the title was changed to Autumn Hearts: A New Beginning. The new title in many ways describes what happens in the movie so is somewhat appropriate; however, Cohen’s original title holds such depth and meaning.

At the onset of World War II Melanie lived in Paris with her parents. One day when she returned home from school they were gone. When she went to a neighbor’s apartment for help, the women handed her over to the authorities. A gold star was sewn on her jacket and she was shipped to Drancy on the outskirts of Paris. Drancy was a way station where people were held until they were shipped to some of the infamous concentration camps of WW II. At Drancy, Melanie met Christopher who was about her age and Jakob. Jakob became their protector and ultimately their savior. He bribed a guard to send him when the children’s names came up to be transported to a camp.

Shortly after Melanie arrived at Drancy, Jakob gave her a notebook and instructed her to keep track of the number of people who came and went from Drancy. For example, she might have noted that 156 men and 144 women and 34 children arrived on a certain day. She kept track of their names and who they were. Jakob told Melanie that she must never forget and that she must be a witness some day of what happened at Drancy.

Eventually when the Allies took Paris, Melanie and Christopher were released from prison. Melanie was sent back to Canada where she grew into a woman who championed every individual who was persecuted around the globe. She became obsessed with writing on behave of anyone who came to her attention. She had filing cabinets full of information on people who were political prisoners. Campaigning for the release of individuals became her life’s mission. The people who paid the price for her devotion were her husband David and her son Ben.

All of this is the backdrop for the story of the reunion of Christopher and Jakob with Melanie. Christopher has become an entomologist while Jakob was rescued from concentration camp by the Russians who continued to keep him in prison or mental hospitals.

I was surprised at how many of the details of the book, I had forgotten since I read it just over four months ago. The movie does not hold a lot of the smaller details of the book but it still conveys the feeling of the book. I noticed that the viewers of the movie did not rate it very highly on imdb.com, but having read the book before hand, I was very appreciative of how well the movie was made. It is set in the eastern townships of Quebec in the autumn. Visually the movie is beautiful. And with just a few flash back scenes the shared experience of Drancy is made clear. The interwoven relationships of the individuals in the story are well defined. Overall I would recommend reading the book or seeing the film. Because of the subject matter it is not a light and entertaining book. Instead it is thought provoking. Both Cohen and director Paolo Barzman evoke feelings of warmth and concern for Melanie who has carried the burden all of her life recording the arithmetic of victims of persecution.

Guest Blog - Barchester Towers

I have finally finished reading Anthony Trollope’s Barchester Towers. In the late winter, the Blogger and I watched the BBC production called The Barchester Chronicles. This series produced in 1982 was based on two novels by Trollope: The Warden and Barchester Towers. I had watched the TV mini-series when it was first shown on PBS’ Mobile Masterpiece Theatre and had off and on looked at the boxed set of DVDs somewhat wistfully. Finally I decided that I could resist no longer and bought the set of shows based on Trollope’s novels.

The Blogger and I started out watching just the first episode and then decided that we would watch the next one before stopping for the night. I think that it took us only a week to watch all 7 episodes or a total of 374 minutes of program. The series left both of us chuckling and wondering what was going to happen next among the small community of clergy from the Church of England. It was fun to see Alan Rickman in one of his earliest roles as the 'villain of the piece.' As a long time viewer of BBC productions on PBS it was delightful to see some of my old friends such as Susan Hampshire and Donald Pleasence.

As I watched the show, I began doing some reading about both the series and about Trollope. One criticism that I read of The Barchester Chronicles. was that the TV series did not give enough substance to Mr. Arabin. The comment was that he was a very interesting character in the novel. Out of curiosity, I checked the novel out from the library. I never got past all of the fascinating information about Trollope in the preface before the book was due to be returned. While on a trip to California in March with my husband, I bought a used copy of Barchester Towers at a bookstore on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley.

Since March I have carried the book on every plane and on every trip in the last six months. In between other books and when I couldn’t get into another book, I would pick up Trollope and read another thirty to forty pages. Now that I have finished the novel, I am feeling a little lost and alone. Trollope had become a really good friend. I really cared about those living in the shadow of the cathedral. The critic was right. Mr. Arabin was more interesting in the novel as were all of the other characters. I enjoyed the humor whether it was subtle or more obvious such as the arrogant Bishop and his ‘bishop-wife' named Proudie or the family of fourteen children belonging to Mr. Quiverful.

Trollope worked for many years in the postal service and is credited with instituting delivery of mail twice a day and the installation of the well known red pillar boxes. He was about forty before his first book was published and he did not like the writing of Charles Dickens at all. Or was that he did not like Dickens at all. I found Trollope so much more enjoyable than I anticipated and am ready to find out what happens in the next book in The Chronicles of Barsetshire. I am eager to find out if the characters are as vivid without having been acquainted with them before hand.

Banned Books Week

This is just a reminder that it’s Banned Books Week (and National Reading Group Month). I thought you might find a few of these articles about banned books interesting:

• The San Juan Capistrano School District banned the Twilight series—oddly enough, it banned it for adult content and not for terrible writing.

• Other recently challenged books include TTYL, Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, and Nineteen Minutes.

• The Guardian offers a quiz on banned books. I failed.

• In semi-related news, The List Universe features the “Top 10 Most Disturbing Novels.”