109 thoughts on “This is a Good Book Thursday, February 21, 2019”

    1. Actually re-read “Agnes & the Hitman” this week. After re-reading “Don’t Look Down”! Loved those books–are any others with Bob Mayer in our future??

      1. The third one with Bob is Wild Ride. Nope, no more. We’re still friends, but as he once put it, “We should never be in the same zip code.” We always end up wanting to kill each other (very different value systems, world views, goals, etc.). He was great to write with, though, very professional and very hard working.

  2. My Brother’s Husband, a Japanese graphic novel about a man coming to terms with his brother’s life and death in a society that has little room for homosexuality.

    It’s really beautiful.

  3. I’m about halfway through with Brene Brown’s “Braving the Wilderness.” It’s great, of course. Giving me a lot to think about as I prepare myself to leave a toxic boss and try somewhere/thing new.

  4. I’ve been rereading John McPhee’s work, mostly from back issues of the New Yorker magazine because I have access to those online. My favorite of the last couple days is “A Textbook Place for Bears” about the increasing black bear population in NJ, written in 1982 I think? Maybe a little later. His writing is clear as water, and just makes me so happy to have read it.

    3. Bears we got. The first night I moved in here, I woke up and this huge black bear went by the window by my bed. He hadn’t gotten the good news that the house wasn’t abandoned anymore.

      1. Oh, my, god. I can’t even imagine. Do you know many native animals there are in New Zealand that might kill you? None. And no snakes, venomous spiders, scorpions or anything else to put you off sleeping in the bush. Occasionally a magpie in breeding season might done bomb you, but that’s pretty much it. There’s katipo I guess, but they’re on the endangered list.

        Maybe that’s why we’re big on adventure sports, just being outside isn’t enough of a risk. Let me jump off a bridge with a rubber band please, there’s no bears here.

          1. We’re not allowed to have bird feeders because of the bears; they’re mad for bird seed. And I LOVE bird feeders.

        3. Black bears are very easy-going. If they think you’re threatening their cubs, they’ll go after you, but otherwise, they’re very laidback. The worst is that they LOVE the garbage. Basically, they’re giant raccoons.

        4. Pretty to look at from a distance, mostly harmless nuisance. The thing we really worry about is ticks. Those buggers are nasty and carry some even nastier sickness.

        5. One of the best young people I know has relocated to NZ where she is a fishing guide and very very happy. This is entirely irrelevant to good books, but having a culture and a wilderness where a young woman can safely guide in the back country is something to rejoice in.

  5. It’s been a badly-good week. Difficulty at work but had time to do my Working Wednesday on the weekend.

    I’m reading Princesses Behaving Badly by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie. It’s billed as ‘real stories from history without the fairy-tale endings.’ I quite like it. Small bite sized pieces of non-fiction that are enjoyable to read.

    2. That reminds me of a book I read before bedtime last year: Rejected Princesses by Jason Porath (horrible title, excellent book). It’s an oversize nonfiction juvenile book that has pictures of the princesses done in the Disney style but with a few text-heavy pages of their background. The author did an excellent job of digging into the history of countries around the world, which meant that I had not heard of most of the princesses featured. Inspirational, educational, and made for very fun dreams!

  6. I’m reading White Rage by Dr. Carol Anderson. She wrote it in response to everything that happened in Ferguson, MO in 2014 and she carefully lays out the history of brutal and systemic legal and extra legal policies that have destroyed black communities and lives since the Reconstruction era.

    I’m white, I’m well educated, I took AP US History in high school, and I read a lot of history books on my own time. And this is like nothing I’ve ever read before. It’s made me realize that, despite my education, that education has come from a very particular and sanitized perspective. It’s made me realize that I’ve never read a single account of the Civil War from the perspective of a modern black scholar. That I’ve known about certain landmark victories like the Emancipation Proclamation and Brown v. Board of Education but that I didn’t have a full picture of their context or the ways that these victories were subsequently and horrifyingly undermined. I knew that Black Codes, Jim Crow, and white resistance to school integration happened, but I had (again) no context for them or understanding of just how horrifically brutal the extralegal enforcement of these things was.

    This book has made me realize I have a lot of gaps in my understanding and it makes me want to fill them in. I definitely recommend it, but just know that it’s an incredibly hard book to read.

      1. Definitely as in emotionally tough. I’m restricting myself to one chapter a day (it’s a short book) because my blood pressure skyrockets because I get so angry. Angry that it happened, angry I didn’t know about it, and angry that it keeps happening. And there’s some well sourced descriptions of lynchings that are liable to give some readers nightmares.

        As far as reading level goes, she is an academic but I think she worked really hard to make it accessible.

    2. I had a similar sense of eclat reading a biography of Charles Hamilton Houston by Genna McNeil. He was a giant in the field of civil rights — a pioneer in school after school, he graduated in 1915 from Amherst as class valedictorian and only black student his year, then became an officer in WWI and was treated so badly that he vowed to get a law degree and did so, at Harvard Law School in the 1920’s.

      He became dean of the Howard University law school, and in that capacity, began gathering research to fight for civil rights by demonstrating that Plessy vs. Ferguson was in fact not a reality. There were sometimes separate facilities for American black citizens, such as schools and public places, but they were seldom if ever equal, and often didn’t exist. He died before the Brown vs. Board of Education decision, and never had a chance to to see the gains made by the civil rights landmarks in the late 1950s and 1960s in the U.S., but he taught and mentored many other young lawyers who went on to create many of those landmarks.

      It frustrates me that he is so obscure to mainstream Americans. His protege Thurgood Marshall became a Supreme Court justice and is revered and remembered, but Houston is not.

      But I’m a better person for having learned about him and his amazing life.

  7. I read Are You Ready to Hatch an Unusual Chicken? by Kelly Jones which was even more adorable than Unusual Chickens for the Exceptional Poultry Farmer. They are about a young Latina girl who moves from Los Angeles to a more northernly part of California to live on her late great-uncle’s dilapidated farm because her dad lost his job. There she discovers some feral chickens who have super powers and a whole community of people dedicated to them. They are late elementary school range. all the chicken information is correct.

    1. This story sounds fun. It’s funny how these chicken stories can resonate. I remember watching the movie Chicken Run with my son when he was young and how taken he was with it. Stories are such an important part of human connection but animal stories can sometimes particularly click. Plus, they can be so adorable:)

    3. I read the first two thirds of this post and was wondering if it was non-fiction and what age it was geared towards and then I got to “who have super powers” and thought okay, not non-fiction and I’m in. 🙂 Sounds great and I put it on hold.

  8. I am almost through Phoenix Rising by Grace Draven. I am finding it a bit dry actually, which is disappointing, because I like slow paced, somewhat dry fantasy. And it is going to end in a cliff hanger. I can see it coming. I want to know what happens, but I don’t want to commit to two or more books. Sigh.

    Shameless plug: Disney bought the rights to Artemis Fowl and are making it into a movie this summer. I really enjoy the author, Eoin Colfer and highly recommend his YA stuff. Airman is my favorite, but The Wish list and the Supernaturalist are great too. Clever, fun and a little dark.

    1. I really liked the Artemis Fowl series! I probably won’t go see the movie. Although, if it ever becomes available on Netflix, I could see myself watching it. I have sooooo many movies I’m behind on – all of Marvels, Star Wars, Star Trek, Harry Potter, really all the franchises and then some.

  10. Since You Asked by Maureen Goo- it’s a YA high school novel. Not a teen romance. It was super cute.

    The Consuming Fire by John Scalzi- second in a series, and you need to read the first book, The Collapsing Empire before you take this one on.

  11. I read “Bet me.” I couldn’t put it down! Your books always get me hooked! You’re such an amazing author! Calvin and Minerva are a dream team! ❤️

  12. The Fixer, by Jennifer Lynne Barnes. Great yarn, great protagonist, excellent prose, eager to read the sequels.

  13. I’m waiting for my daughter to finish up book 2 of the Heroes of Olympus so I can read it. She won’t share it with me, which is causing lots of amusement in our house.

    Also, there’s a new Beth Byers/Violet Carlyle up on Kindle Unlimited.

  14. I read The Traveling Cat Companion by Hiro Arikawa? It’s not long; I finished it in a couple of hours. It’s Told from the cat’s point of view, and I admit, there were some tears flowing (Bear in mind that I cry easily) towards the end.

    The next one I read was Meet Me at the Museum by Anne Youngson. Like Traveling Cat, it is not a long book, and I read it in a couple of hours.

    1. I just read “The Dali Lama’s Cat” this past week and I loved the simple tale told by the cat’s point of view. It is an introduction to Buddhism in some ways but nothing to hit you over the head with.

  15. This week I started on a reread of the Chronicles of St. Mary’s. I can’t believe the number of times I passed over these books in the library thinking they were the usual mystery with clever nun sleuth. So far no sign of a nun. It is @ surviving time travel, excuse me, investigating historical events in a contemporary setting. Good thing someone here recommended them.

    I have also been reading the Stewart “hoagy” Hoag and Lulu mysteries.. (Lulu is his basset hound), which I have enjoyed.

  16. I had to go back to last Thursday to see what I was reading…

    [That] week I finished the first Murderbot book, and added the others to my wish list. [No change, there.]

    I’m 2/3 of the way through Good Omens, and will likely finish tonight. [Nope. I didn’t finish, but my Kindle says I’m ~75% done. There’s a 7th book by Mia Archer in the queue behind it.]

    I’m 30 chapters into Dance of a Lifetime by Frank Downey. [100 chapters (of 175) now. This may be some of what distracted me this week.]

    Somehow, I started re-reading Wearing the Cape. [25 chapters into it. And at some point, I re-read Recursion, which seems (only seems) to cover the very same time frame in an alternate universe.]

    …the audiobook of Getaway Girl… ended up in my Downpour Library. [But I haven’t started listening yet.]

    I think I lost ground on regular reading because I binge-read the archives of several webcomics. “Too Much Information,” “Grrl Power,” “Questionable Content”. I started the week with links to 26 webcomics in Chrome. I eliminated at least six, and a batch of the others only update… occasionally. That’s still a lot of distraction.

    I guess the other distraction was shopping. I went to Walmart to pick up a prescription at their pharmacy, and, well, Walmart. I bought beef, chicken and pork, then ate a huge vegetarian salad for dinner. Weird. But it’ll be meat and potatoes tonight.

    Back to the books. Got some catching up to do.

    2. Ha ha re Murderbot and ‘no change there’. Is there anyone in Argh _not_ on that wagon? I could do a story going back to see the % of Thursdays that don’t mention it. My hold for book three at the library has just come up, so welcome aboard.

  17. I read Mother Bruce by Ryan T. Higgins, author & illustrator to youngest granddaughter this morning. (Prolonging the drive to school.) Very cute book and the illustrations are terrific. Cute story.

    Finished Murder, Magic and What We Wore, started The Prayer Box, which is languishing by the bed, started A Promise Kept by Robin Lee Hatcher which is beside the printer/scanner. May take a while to finish as I read while waiting for scanner.
    Re-read The Coast Road again. Re-Read a chapter of Agnes and the Hitman. All over the place with books right now.

    Must be the February blues even with the sun shining. Probably it’s the long To-Do list. And I missed getting my stuff on the truck going to the arctic. That means, air freight, mucho $$.

    Oh well, carrying on, going to see Mary Poppins Returns with eldest grand-daughter who is having a day with me today. We are happy, curling hair, and eating cinnamon buns.

  18. I read The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin. I think someone here recommended it – thank you!

    And now I’m re-reading The Goblin Emperor for the fifth time. I love that book.

  20. I love all these recommendations. Feral chickens? Oh my.
    I finished The Victory Garden by Rhys Bowen. The Victory Garden takes place in the late stages WWI, by which time few families were untouched by its ravages. Women from all walks of life volunteered to fill the jobs men left behind.
    Emily Bryce lost her brother in the first months of the war and most of the young men she knew haven’t come back. Her well to do, overprotective parents despise the young Australian pilot she meets in the convalescent home near their estate. When Emily turns twenty-one, she escapes her stifling life and enlists in the Land Girl Army.
    I found the book fascinating, full of wonderful memorable characters and situations. My biggest problem Was that it ended.
    Also read A Ghost of A Chance by Cherie Claire (first in a series and free on all platforms)Great read.it takes place after Katrina. Ghosts, History and a heartwarming heroine. It did need a copy edit but I still loved it.

  21. I listened to “Wild Ride” this week, then Terry Pratchett’s “Interesting Times,” and now I’m doing a comfort read of a Barbara Michaels (Elizabeth Peters). I did read Murderbot #1 and enjoyed it quite a bit. I’m reading a biography of John Marshall at bedtime, since I read those kinds of books in short bits, anyway.

  22. I read A Cold Day for Murder, the first book in the Kate Shugak series by Dana Stabenow. I’m sure I first heard about this series here, so thanks to all who recommended it. I am now half way through the second book. I am really enjoying it. And there are some 20 books to go!

  23. I’ve been rereading Alexis Hall: Waiting for the Flood, Glitterland, and now For Real. Great m/m erotic romances. For extra comfort, I’ve been watching Star Trek: The Next Generation, which is reminding me of Listen with Mother (old radio series on the BBC, which always began, ‘Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.’)

    1. I started a new-to-me Alexis Hall this week. A genetically enhanced future with merpeople. Frankly, I have no idea how it is going to end. It’s pretty sad so far.

  24. Read and enjoyed Not Quite a Husband by Sherry Thomas. She is a hit-or-miss writer for me. I couldn’t read her YA stuff at all, but this book was definitely a hit.
    Also re-read Angel Seeker by Sharon Shinn. I haven’t read it in a while, so it felt fresh and wonderful. Gosh, I love this writer. Her Samaria stories about angels are among the best in fantasy fiction. And her angels are unlike any other angels you’ve read about in speculative fiction.

    1. I adore her Elementals series. Zoe and Darien are two of my favourite characters ever. And Summers At Castle Auburn.

    2. Glad to hear that about Sherry Thomas. I tried her and wasn’t hooked. I will try again. Also, I am a huge fan of Sharon Shinn 🙂

  25. Mind slipping
    I also read Every Heart A Doorway by Seanann Maguire.
    Wow! Lyrical, horrifying and unputdownable.
    I do NOT like the horror genre. But this is beyond that. A fairy tale that is both a rainbow and a spider’s web. This woman can Write! I shall be reading the rest of the series. Highly recommend.

  26. My mom (88) is having speech issues, she’s having trouble with word find. It’s apparently vascular (mini-strokes), not advancing aphasia or Alzheimers, we were very cheered up by the visit to the doctor yesterday. One suggestion is that she read aloud 20 minutes a day, so she may be recording some stories for the great-grandchildren. She’s a passionate reader of fiction, so it’s no hardship, and I look forward to hearing what she chooses.

    1. So I have some word finding difficulties both as a medication side effect and from my giant enchanting TBI. One of the suggestions that I got which has been (unexpectedly and surprisingly) helpful has been to do puzzles – any kind of puzzle – word find, crossword, sudoku, logic, mazes, jigsaw, Tetris – any kind, and to mix it up as much as possible/tolerable. It was not a quick solution but over a period of 10-14 weeks things got steadily better and I now notice if I stop doing puzzles my quality of words used deteriorates etc. This may of course be entirely irrelevant and useless – please don’t be offended. It was so scary to have words not be there and be wrong that anything seemed worth trying.

      1. Nope, I do puzzles every day for the same reason. WaPo has a good crossword every day (three on Sunday!) and I have Jigsaw Puzzle on my iPad. They’re a break from obsessing over the book, the weather, the taxes . . .

          1. I use them to iron out my brain. I get frazzled and overwhelmed and go do a jigsaw puzzle.
            I like the ones with food (g).

      2. Not at all, Mom does the daily crossword, also plays bridge online. I do the Sudoku. Some of the Sudoku. And the NYT crossword on line.

  27. I read the last two part of the Bride Quartet-series by Nora Roberts: “Savor the Moment” and “Happy Ever After”. I like the latter slightly more than the former, perhaps because the love interest-man in the latter is more my taste than in book 3, or book 2 for that matter. Anyway, it was nice to reread these books, although misinterpretations of the translator and grammatical errors keep annoying me these days when I read translated books. Argh.

    F and I finished reading part 3 of the The Nicci Chronicles-series by Terry Goodkind: “Siege of Stone”. We’d expected it to be the last book in that series, but apparently it wasn’t. I’m still finding myself disapointed in the later books of this author, whose first series – Sword of Truth – is one of my favourites. Unfortunately, the 2nd and 3rd series don’t manage to keep it up. Not bad books, and there are still touching moments and a lot of characters you start caring about, but it doesn’t really work out all the way and none of the books in this series has come close to a 5-star-rating.
    (And sometimes I’ve been exclaiming: “I’d like to have a talk with the editor of this book for this is weird writing!” – mostly about repetitive parts and descriptions. *deleted rant*. Argh.)
    We will still read the next one when it’s released, even though I suspect we’ll be al ittle less excited about it than we’ve been for previous books.

    I also read a Swedish popular science book by a Swedish-Korean author named Soki Choi, about Kimchi (sort of Korean sauerkraut [but spicier, I expect – there was chili in the recipes]), Kombucha (fermented, sparkling tea) and bowels, bacteria and the possible connection between your guts and your brain. It was very well and accessibly written, in the way that it would work out for schools or just any interested person without any academic-vocabulary-skills. I found the thoughts, ideas and research about how our intestines might be connected to our well-being not just physically, but also mentally, very interesting. If it’d been translated, I’d definitely recommend it! Or you have to learn Swedish so you can read it 🙂 There were also recipes for Kimchi and Kombucha at the end of the book. I might try making both, when I get time/possibility. (I bought and tried a bottle of Kombucha today, and it was super weird and interesting and I really liked it 🙂 so it’d be cool to be able to make it myself.)

    2. So I made kimchi last summer and yes, it is spicy. Spicy spicy spicy. Also? I strongly advise you do not make it with something squishy, such as the cucumber. Even though it is delicious, it is also squishy and there is the potential for a sensation of slime on the tongue. At least until you are confident of how much kimchi y’all will get through and so forth, stick with the crunchy stuff – cabbage, radish, daikon, turnip.

    3. Also kombucha is very easy to make. And you can put chia seeds in it which seems like it would be untenably disgusting and is instead quite nice.

      Anything you ferment – yogurt, sauerkraut, quick pickles, proper pickles, kombucha, kimchi – all of those things will produce both lots of nice gut bacteria and also the fermenting liquid is often very nice in unrelated foods.

        1. Yes! The pickle is the friend of your belly and (so current research indicates) your brain! (also I got a great recipe for coleslaw dressing using pickle juice – sounds gross but is delicious – from the nyt cooking section last year and even the legendarily fussy nieces will eat it! Pickles FTW!!)

    4. It did indeed not sound like an impossible task to make Kombucha yourself. Or Kimchi either, for that matter. And I very much like spicy things. I only have this ominous feeling I(!) will screw it up, no matter how easy it seems. Perhaps I should convince my mum to come visit me so we can experiment together. She’s 100 % into these things nowadays (she was the one recommending the book), so I bet she’d like to give it a shot. (Although I also suspect she will suggest I go to Sweden instead…we’ll see who’s the stronger convincer!)

      Thanks for the encouragement, everyone! We eat a lot of pickled things and sauerkraut (however the latter mostly as stamppot, i.e. mashed potatoes with the sauerkraut stomped into it), we both think it’s a good complement to food.

      Yesterday I started on another book on the same subject, let’s see what ideas and inspirations I can get out of that one…

  28. I just finished _The End of Mr Y_ which went from being pretty good, to great in the middle-end (both a total lark and treating a serious thing in a way most books I read don’t) and then suddenly the ending happened. Nearly And Then They Woke Up. There are even two guns left on the mantel that I was really looking forward to seeing used.

    I still sort of recommend it, but I sure wonder if that’s the ending the author always meant or if it was getting out of hand and s/he just wound it up.

    1. That’s a little bit something that happens in the 3 Scarlett Thomas books for adults I read – they tend to be pretty open-ended, so there’s a lot of space to make your own closure for the characters. My suspicion, especially after popco (which I loved) is that she got almost derailed from the story-telling by her research and balancing the science and maths and story kind of tips over and then it ends.

  29. I read the Great Passage (in translation) by Shion Mira, which is fiction about a group of people working on a dictionary in Japan and I loved it – it is somehow very matter of fact about both the characters’ passion for words and thoroughness while also acknowledging their peculiarity and social challenges without being snippy or condescending. Maybe I read it before, but if so this is the time it is sticking. And then I also read Gaviotas, which is non-fiction about an ecological restoration village in a remote and fairly desolate and stompled piece of Columbia and the ways in which they have succeeded (many) and struggled (many) and how they learned to use their (many) failures as fodder for improvements and new ideas.

  30. Reading a Tessa Dare (thanks for the recco here), The Governess Game. So far, enjoyable. Helps that I know Greenwich, so I recognize how well the place is captured.

    Also read Sophie Kinsella, I Owe You One. I like a well done first person present, and here’s an author who excells in confiding mode, like a coffee with your BFF. However, at some point it became evident that Incident might happen, leading to Big Misunderstanding. Even though I kept urging, “don’t go there, don’t go there,” Arghers, she went. Got cleaned up, of course, along the way to earned HEA, but still.

  31. I’ve been on a huge mystery kick recently. I usually prefer series, as I enjoy becoming familiar with characters and getting a feel for the setting. My most recent binge is Barbara Cleverly’s Joe Sandilands mysteries, a Golden Age style series featuring an almost to good to be true detective with well plotted, believable crimes. Highly recommended for anyone partial to mysteries looking for a new series, with 13 books so far.

  32. I’ve been reading the twitter discussion of the great romancelandia plagiarism scandal that just broke.
    http://www.courtneymilan.com/ramblings/2019/02/18/cristiane-serruya-is-a-copyright-infringer-a-plagiarist-and-an-idiot/

    And then many many tweets as other authors found they had been plagiarized too.

    As Milan pointed out “ Cristiane Serruya has to be the biggest idiot out there. I’ve sold several hundred thousand copies of this book. I’ve given away several hundred thousand copies on top of that. Does she think that readers are never going to notice her blatant plagiarism?

    And then there’s the fact that it’s me. Look, I’m not special in any other way and I don’t want to toot my own horn to much, but if I were an unethical plagiarist and I was looking to plagiarize a romance author, I would pick literally anyone except the one who clerked for the Supreme Court, taught intellectual property as a law professor, and doesn’t back down from a fight.

    You follow me on Twitter, Cristiane. How stupid can you get?”

    I feel awful for the authors she did this to (and for the ghost writers she ripped off—apparently she gave them scenes from a bunch of books and asked them to “edit “ them into final form, and then didn’t pay them.)

  33. I read “How to Game the Walk of Shame” and it was funny and sweet and adorable. It’s so nice to just get lost in a book that is FUN. Now I’m reading The Happiness Advantage. Yes, there’s a theme in my reading.

        1. A bit late perhaps but still – Thank you, Jane! I’ve written them down now, let’s see if I can find them somewhere…

    1. Wow. There are some seriously big names on that list, women with deep pockets who make big bucks for their publishers. Not a fight I’d want to be in if I were a plagiarist.

      But I’m not so I’m good.

      1. Nora Roberts? Who in their right mind plagiarizes from her?

        Or from a Supreme Court clerk who teaches intellectual property….

  35. At the recommendation of someone here, I read Luckiest Lady in London by Sherry Thomas. I really enjoyed it, partially because the heroine was different from the average husband hunting ingenue. So I tried another, Tempting the Bride. It was also a pleasure and I especially appreciated them while I was in waiting rooms or on the train.

  36. I read Sherry Thomas’s ‘My Beautiful Enemy’, which was fun, except the hero and heroine (who loved each other beyond measure) had to separate because they suspected ( not knew – SUSPECTED) the other was a spy for an enemy country. So they did. Separated, I mean. Without – um – talking about it. Or checking to make sure. Or doing anything at all sensible. Of course it all worked out in the end, but they wasted an awful lot of time.

    Then I read Meghan Scott Molin’s The Frame-up, about a young woman who writes super hero comics, and gets caught up in an actual super hero investigation – that was a LOT of fun.

    And now I’m in the middle of The Poppy War by RF Kuang, which is totally gripping fantasy about a young peasant girl in a fictional historical China (sort of), who sets out to escape a forced marriage by studying for the exam that will take her to an elite military academy. So far it’s wonderful.

  37. I’m having a hard time finding books by authors I usually enjoy that aren’t over-priced. I can’t help but balk at $12.99 for an e-book. (A trade paperback, sure.)

    However, I’ve read a few good, not quite so pricey ones lately, such as In Farleigh Field by Rhys Bowen. In other WWII novels, I enjoyed the Dr. Bones books by Emma Jameson. I read them awhile back and may have mentioned them here. She also wrote some contemporary police procedurals which are good reads.

    Anyway, I just got the first Murderbot book, seeing as so many people here recommended the series. Also The Goblin Emperor, for the same reason. Nothing but good reads ahead!

  38. Cat Sebastian for me this week, m/m historical, since I’ve run out of KJ Charles. And I enjoyed them, but I prefer the characters and magic and sedition and plotting and twists that KJ Charles delivers. To each their own.

  39. I’m sleeping not reading this week. I swear I could hibernate this time of year. And it doesn’t make sense because the days are getting longer.

    A friend came over to tea and I could barely talk. She was wondering why I was so groggy! I’m like this every February. I need to find a beach somewhere warm and lie there until I absorb enough vitamin D.

  40. I’ve been reading a variety of items this week such as:

    The new Jonathan Kellerman, entitled The Wedding Guest, is another workmanlike mystery/psychological thriller featuring psych. Alex Delaware and his partner in crime Det. Milo Sturgis. They’re solving the murder of a woman found dead during a wedding reception using Alex’s psychological insights and Milo’s detective know how. After so many books, Kellerman definitely has a bit of a formula going but nonetheless I enjoy reading his work.

    The new J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts), Connections in Death, featuring Det. Eve Dallas and her cohorts, is a similarly workmanlike mystery set in 2050s New York City. This time they’re investigating the death of a former gang member. No real surprises here, but I enjoy reading about Eve and Roark and Peabody and the gang. They’re just a fun bunch.

    The Lost Traveler by Sheila Conolly, which is part of a mystery series set in Ireland and featuring a female pub owner who is a transplant from Boston. I enjoyed the Irish “scenery” and there were some interesting ruminations about the Irish branch of the Roma people.

    Redeemer, by C.E. Murphy, is a 1940s fantasy set in 1940s Chicago and featuring a strong female character, literally a Rosie the Riveter type, who, along with some friends, is fighting demons. Interesting twist on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer scenario. Nothing beats Buffy, natch, but I did enjoy this book. I think the urban shaman series by the same author is more interesting to me, however. If anyone is looking for some fun urban fantasy, they should check out that series.

    The new C.J. Cherryh sci fi novel – Alliance Rising – which is a continuation of the Downbelow and Cyteen universe of stories. Set on a space station and eems to involve the usual complex political and cultural clashes and machinations that Cherryh is so good at. Just started, so more later.

    Also enjoying Gunnerkrigg Court online which is just a beautiful web comic fantasy serial. Definitely recommend!

  42. This is something I rarely do, if ever, is cancelling a book I’ve had on hold at the library. The Sweetest Thing by Judith McNaught. If it is ever issued I may try again. It’s just plain silly to have an issue date of Dec. 31, 2045.

    Dana Stabenow’s first book A Cold Day for Murder was probably my first ebook after getting a kindle. And it was free at that time and I wanted to give this new fangled gadget a try. That particular kindle only needed charging once a month, I’ve since moved on to the HD version and that one needs charging daily, but it does everything but the laundry.

    I read a few years ago the Nora Roberts was plagiarized by another famous author and it involved a law suit. The author has since passed away and the story has vanished.

    1. Janet Dailey died? (Googles.). OMG she did.
      She plagiarize Nora in more than one book, which was terribly hard on Nora because Janet had been a mentor and she really looked up to her. A betrayal like that by a friend is ten times as painful.

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