Tag: mystery

The Oxford Murders

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Martinez, Guillermo. The Oxford Murders. Translated by Sonia Soto. Read by Jonathan Davis. Blackstone Audio, 2007.

Reason read: April is Mathematics, Science & Technology month. This would fall into the math category.

The mathematics behind a serial killer. This is one of those murder mysteries where the clues don’t add up to the crime. When an elderly woman is found dead everyone presumes a family member committed the crime for the money. The woman was going to die of cancer anyway. Someone just couldn’t wait for the inheritance. But, enter world renowned logician Arthur Seldom, author on the mathematics of serial killers, who describes a note left for him indicating this murder is only the first one. There will be more. The curious thing is each subsequent murder victim was already dying of an ailment and every death is accompanied by a strange series of mathematical symbols. It’s up to an Argentine math student (loosely based on the author) to crack the case.

My favorite part of the book – Seldom explaining how to hide a crime.

Author fact: Martinez has written a bunch of other stuff but only The Oxford Murders is on my Challenge list.

Narrator trivia: Jonathan Davis uses great accents to differentiate the characters. He is so much fun I have decided to actively seek out other audio books he has narrated.

Book trivia: The Oxford Murders was made into a movie in 2008.

Nancy said: Nancy called this book a “cerebral puzzle that always makes me wish I were smarter than I am” (p 171).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Oxford: Mysteries” (p 171).

Blue Lightning

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Cleeves, Ann. Blue Lightning. New York: Minotaur Books, 2010.

Reason read: to finish the series started in January in honor of the Shetland Up Helly Aa festival.

In Blue Lightning Jimmy Perez, now engaged to Fran, the woman he met in Cleeves’s first book Raven Black, takes her home to meet his parents. He’s not looking forward to the trip because he doesn’t get along with his father and home is a smidgen of an island called Fair Isle. When Jimmy was younger he couldn’t wait to move away and escape the trappings of parental expectations. True to form, murder follows Jimmy & Fran (she found the murder victims in Raven Black). Thanks to terrible storms prohibiting people from coming to or leaving the island they are forced, along with Jimmy’s partner, Sandy, to solve the crime without help from the mainland. Things go from bad to worse when there is a second murder and shockingly, a third. This time the murders center around birds as the killer has woven bird feathers though the first victim’s hair & strewn feathers over the second victim’s body.

For the most part I enjoyed this fourth book in the Jimmy Perez series. It isn’t necessary to read the other three to understand or enjoy Blue Lightning. My only complaint? After the second death I knew when the third victim would die.

Book trivia: In the acknowledgments Cleeves makes reference to a crime scene saying, “probably the most awkward crime scene I’ve yet devised.” It made me curious to know if I would recognize the scene (spoiler alert: because in every Cleeves mystery so far multiple people have died, hence multiple crime scenes). What would make one particular crime scene awkward. Then, I got to it, recognized it & decided, yes it’s awkward.

Author fact:  I don’t have anything new to share about Ms. Cleeves except to say the series continues after Blue Lightning.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Sheltering in the Shetlands” (p 205).

April Snow Job

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As we move into April I am not confident we won’t get another 26″ snow storm. If we ever joked in the past about not being able to predict the weather, now it is impossible. It’s no laughing matter. My rose bushes, right now struggling under the weight of frozen water, could tell you that. But never mind the weather. Let’s talk about the month of April. April is another 10k for cancer. I’m hoping to break the hour time since I was five seconds away in March. April is also Easter. April is my sister’s birth month. April is also books, books and more books…of course:

Fiction:

  • ‘F’ is For Fugitive by Sue Grafton ~ in honor of Grafton’s birth month. Technically, I should have read all the “alphabet” books by Grafton one right after the other, but I didn’t have that system when I read “A” is for Alibi. I think it goes without saying I do now.
  • The Diplomatic Lover by Elsie Lee ~ in honor of Lee’s birth month. I am not looking forward to this one even though it looks like a quick read.
  • A Celibate Season by Carol Shields ~ in honor of April being Letter Writing Month. This is so short I should be able to read it in one sitting.

Nonfiction:

  • Henry James: the Untried Years (1843 – 1870) by Leon Edel ~ in honor of James’s birth month. This first volume chronicles James’s childhood and youth.
  • Coming into the Country by John McPhee ~ in honor of the Alaska trip I’m taking in August.

Series continuations:

  • The Rise of Endymion by Dan Simmons ~ this is to finish the series started in January, in honor of Science Fiction month. I liked Endymion the best so I have high hopes for The Rise of Endymion. I am listening to this on audio and reading the print because I know I will never finish the 575+ pages by April 30th.
  • Blue Lightning by Ann Cleeves ~ this is to finish the series started in January, in honor of Shetland’s fire festival, Up Helly Aa. This is another one I should be able to finish in a day or two.

Early Review for LibraryThing:

  • My Life with Bob by Pamela Paul

Extra (for fun):

  • Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara- ~ my sister sent this in my belated birthday package. Whatever she recommends I usually end up liking whether it be music or books. For those of you who really know me – I know what you’re thinking. Yes, my birthday was in February. I got the birthday package over a month later. It’s what we do.

If there is time (since three books are really, really short):

  • Another Part of the Wood by Kenneth Clark ~ in honor of National Library Week
  • The Oxford Murders by Guillermo Martinez ~ in honor of April’s Mathematics, Science and Technology Week
  • Lost Upland by WS Merwin ~ in honor of well, you know the song…April in Paris. Cheesy, I know.

March of the Books

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Here’s the singular thing I love, love, love about March: the St. Patrick’s Day Road Race in Holyoke, MA. I adore running this race. Runner’s World magazine has mentioned it more than once, calling it the mini Boston Marathon for it’s toughness. I PR’ed this year! But what I am more excited about is that this time I was only five seconds away from breaking an hour. Unlike last year (1:07:and something seconds) I was 1 hour and a measly four seconds. But, enough about running! Here are the books finished for March, 2017:

  • Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote (AB +EB)*
  • Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel (AB + print)
  • Falling Angels by Barbara Gowdy*
  • Treachery in the Yard by Adimchinma Ibe*

Nonfiction:

  • Breaks of the Game by David Halberstam (DNF)
  • Big Empty edited by Ladette Randolph and Nina Shevchuk-Murray (EB)
  • No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin (AB)

Series continuations:

  • Red Bones by Ann Cleeves
  • Hall of a Thousand Columns by Tim Mackintosh-Smith (DNF)
  • Endymion by Dan Simmons

Early Review “won”:

  • Ma Speaks Up by Marianne Leone (received and finished)
  • My Life with Bob by Pamela Paul (This has arrived & I have started it)

*Short enough to read in one day.

Red Bones

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Cleeves, Ann. Red Bones. New York: Minotaur Press, 2009.

Reason read: I started the Cleeves series in January in honor of the Up Helly Aa festival. This is the third book in the series.

Detective Jimmy Perez has a new case. At first it is a simple open and shut accidental shooting involving his partner’s grandmother and a rabbit hunt gone wrong. Sandy’s grandmother has been found dead of a gunshot wound and Sandy’s own cousin, Ronald Clouston, confessed to hunting rabbits by moonlight. It was just a horrible mistake. Or was it? Weird coincidences start piling up. Just days before Mina’s death old pieces of a skeleton were found on her property. She had approved an archaeology dig just steps from her front door and a student, hoping to prove existence of an ancient estate on the property, discovered the bones. This same student later discovers ancient coins, proving her theory. She is elated. So, when she is found dead of an apparent suicide, supposedly despondent over Mina’s death, everyone is shocked. What is going on? It’s up to Jimmy to figure it out. While his love interest (Fran from the other Cleeves mysteries) is away in London, he has plenty of time.
A bonus to Red Bones is that Jimmy’s partner, Sandy, plays a bigger role in this mystery. Because it involves his family we get to see more of his character.

As an aside, I can see why Raven Black was everyone’s favorite. I found Red Bones a bit whiny for lack of a better term. Everyone seems really emotional, especially Sandy and not just because his grandmother died. And. And! And, why is it that Jimmy Perez is the only murder investigator in all of the Shetland Islands? He never seems to work with anyone else on a case.

Author fact: My first fact was about how Cleeves is the reader-in residence at a crime writing festival. My second fact was about the awards she either has been short listed for or has won. My third fact, taken from the dust jacket, is that she lives in Yorkshire, England (as of 2009).

Book trivia: this time there is a map of the Shetland Islands in the book (no need to go to Cleeves’ website this time).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go again, in the chapter called “Sheltering in the Shetlands” (p 204).

Treachery in the Yard

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Ibe, Adimchinma. Treachery in the Yard. New York: Minotaur Books, 2010.

Reason read: Nigeria’s new president was sworn into office March of 2005.

Meet Tamunoemi “Tammy” Peterside. If this was a television show or a movie, Tammy would be the barely playing by the rules, dripping with sarcasm, wise mouthed but good looking cop who goes rogue from time to time. He would play by his own rules but always for the best reasons, of course. He’d have a beautiful girlfriend he pretends to care nothing about but wear a fierce loyalty to his work on his sleeve. In Treachery in the Yard he is the creation of Adimchinma Ibe, designed to be around for awhile. In this first mystery Tammy needs to solve a bombing that has left several people dead and a politician wounded. Every time Tammy gets close to the truth another body finds its way to the morgue. When someone very close to him is the next murder victim, Tammy knows he has to wrap up the case and fast. The ending may seem a little predictable and Ibe makes too many references to the heat, but other than that this is a good read!

Lines I liked, “You have to spend a lot of time climbing over the bodies to get to the truth” (p 49) and “Nothing is tough if you have an Uzi” (p 143).

As an aside, for a such a short book Ibe mentions Nigeria’s poverty a lot (I already mentioned the heat). Many sentences contained the words “could not afford,” or “it was expensive,” or “no new [fill in the blank],” or “it is cheaper to [fill in the blank].” I counted nearly a dozen such phrases by page 66, not even halfway through the book. It was a little distracting.

Author fact: Adimchinma was born in 1977 which makes me older than him by a few years.

Book trivia: Treachery in the Yard is a super short novel or a longer short story. At only 146 pages one could read it in one sitting. I did.

Nancy said: Pearl said she is confident we will see more of Adimchinma Ibe “in years to come” (p 157). She was right. He has gone on to publish another Tammy Peterside mystery titled Cronies.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called simply, “Nigeria” (p 157).

Spring Forward

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I’m really looking forward to spring. The chance to run outside (sorry, New Guinea) & a little more green in my life. Here are the books planned:

Fiction:

  • Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel ~ in honor of the best time to visit Mexico (AB). I think this will only take a few days to read so I’m adding:
  • Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote (AB) as a backup ~ in honor of the Oscars (even though they just happened, embarrassingly so).
  • Falling Angels by Barbara Gowdy ~ in honor of the time Niagara Falls stopped flowing, and,
  • Treachery in the Yard by Adimchinma Ibe ~ in honor of Nigeria’s president as of 2015.

Both of these fictions are short-short so I should be able to read them in a day or two each.

Nonfiction:

  • Breaks in the Game by David Halberstam ~ in honor of March Madness (basketball)
  • The Big Empty edited by Ladette Randolph ~ in honor of Nebraska becoming a state in March.

Series Continuations:

  • Red Bones by Ann Cleeves ~ to continue the series started in January in honor of Up Helly Aa.
  • Endymion by Dan Simmons ~ to continue the series started in January in honor of Science Fiction month. This sucker is 600 pages long. Not sure I’ll finish it in time…
  • Hall of a Thousand Columns by Tim Mackintosh-Smith ~ to continue the series started in February in honor of Exploration month. This is an ILL and it hasn’t arrived yet, so I’m not sure I will finish it in time.

Early Review for LibraryThing:

  • Ma Speaks Up by Marianne Leonne ~ maybe. I “won” it in February but it hasn’t arrived yet.
  • EDITED to ADD: I just got word I also “won” My Life with Bob by Pamela Paul. It isn’t expected to arrive for awhile so this is really an April book.

White Nights

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Cleeves, Ann. White Nights. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2008.

Reason read: to continue the series started with Raven Black in honor of Shetland’s Viking Fire Fest (Up Helly Aa) in January.

Jimmy Perez (from Raven Black) is back in White Nights. Even though this is a sequel it could be read on its own. A few characters are the same but the plot is not a continuation of the first. This time it’s  midsummer in the Shetland Islands, a time when the sun doesn’t set completely and there’s always a hint of light. It’s the time for insomnia and…murder. A stranger has come to the Shetland Islands to  disrupt the art opening of established artist, Bella Sinclair. Crying and creating a scene, he succeeds in ruining the party and then disappears into the night. When the same stranger is found wearing a clown mask and hanging from the rafters in an old fishing shed Jimmy Perez must untangle the mystery. Who was this masked man, why did he create such a disturbance at Bella’s party and why is he now dead? Jimmy is sure it’s murder. Each question leads Jimmy to clues that further confuse him. When another man is found dead, this time the nephew of Bella Sinclair, it seems obvious someone wants to hurt Bella…but why?

Author fact: last time the fact was Cleeves was the reader-in-residence for the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival & that’s still true. This time the fact is Cleeves was short listed twice for the CWA Gold Dagger Award before winning the Duncan Lawrie Dagger Award.

Book trivia: Fran (from the first book) finds the two bodies. This time Kenny finds the two bodies.

Nancy said: I think I’ll skip Nancy said part when it comes to series. Most of the time she isn’t going to say anything different about the second, third, or even fourth book.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Sheltering in the Shetlands” (p 204).

Raven Black

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Cleeves, Ann. Raven Black. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2006.

Reason read: Shetland celebrates a Viking Fire fest on the last Tuesday in January called Up Helly Aa. Of course part of Raven Black takes place during Up Helly Aa.

Meet Inspector Jimmy Perez. In Ann Cleeves’s “Shetland” series, Perez is the angst-ridden, private detective charged with solving murders in the Shetland Islands. In Raven Black a teenager is brutally strangled just before the Up Helly Aa festival. Proximity and rumor make neighbor Magnus Tait the likely suspect. Magus, elderly and mentally ill has been the prime suspect in another unsolved crime from eight years ago: an eleven year old went missing and her body, never found.

Spoiler and Confessional: I had to roll my eyes just a little when I read the premise for this book: tiny community is rocked by the murder of a teenager. Everyone thinks the strange recluse with mental illness committed the crime because he probably killed the girl who went missing eight years ago, as well. After all, that man on the hill is not quite right. Cleeves takes that stereotype even further by making the mentally ill man look as guilty as possible along the way. The shocker would have been, yup, he did do it. Guilty as charged.

Author fact: at the time of publication, Ann Cleeves was the reader-in-residence for the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival.

Tons of book trivia: Raven Black is the first book in the Inspector Jimmy Perez series. There are three more, all on my list. Another piece of trivia: on her website, Ann Cleeves includes a map of Jimmy Perez’s Shetland. Very helpful. Also, Raven Black was made into a television series for the BBC in 2012. Last piece of trivia (and probably the most important one), Raven Black won the Duncan Lawrie Dagger Award.

Nancy said: “murder most foul” (p 205). Okay, so she could have said “murder most fowl” since the title of the book includes a bird and the murder victim was ravaged by ravens…

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the obvious chapter called “Sheltering in the Shetlands” (p 204).

Thanks for the Books

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November was a stressful month. The injury that sidelined me for the last half marathon of the season continued to plague me & myself but I pushed through it – ran 70 miles for the month. I don’t think I have ever mentioned this here but…back on January I was a dumbass and agreed to a 1000k challenge. By November 1st I had 267k left to go. I’m now down to 151k. Almost 100 miles. But enough of that. It stresses me out to even think about it.

Here are the books finished for November:
Fiction:

  • Goodbye, Mr. Chips by James Hilton. I thought of this as a short story because it’s less than 100 pages long.
  • Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
  • The City and the City by China Mieville (AB)
  • Advise and Consent by Allen Drury – confessional: I knew that a fictional political book might bore the crap out of me but what I didn’t expect was outright disgust after the election. I couldn’t stomach the contents of Advise and Consent.

Series:

  • Then There Were Five by Elizabeth Enright. (AB)
  • Love Songs From a Shallow Grave by Colin Cotterill
  • Toast to Tomorrow by Manning Coles

Nonfiction:

  • Living Poor by Moritz Thomsen
  • Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn (audio and print)
  • Baby Doctor by Perri Klass
  • The Fifties by David Halberstam

Postscript: it came in too late for me to mention here, but I DID get that Early Review book that I was pining for. I’ll review it next month.

Toast To Tomorrow

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Coles, Manning. A Toast To Tomorrow. Boulder: Rue Morgue Press, 1940.

Reason read: to continue the series started in October in honor of Octoberfest.

Spoiler Alert: In the first installment of Manning Coles’s series the reader is to think Tommy Hambledon has drowned. However, on the cover of A Toast to Tomorrow it reads “The second Tommy Hambledon book” so you know he’s in it somehow. No mystery there.
The real mystery begins within a radio broadcast. Someone is sending Morse coded messages hidden in a drama; a code that hasn’t been used since World War I. British Intelligence knows something is amiss. But what? One of my favorite parts of Toast was the different ways key people heard the broadcast and how they reacted.
But, back to Tommy Hambledon. He washes ashore in Belgium with a nasty wound to the head and a chewed up face. He can’t remember his own name but can speak German fluently. His rescuers assume he is wounded German soldier and Hambledon agrees with that identity until his memory comes back: probably the best line to sum up A Toast to Tomorrow is uttered by Hambledon: “”I am the Deputy Chief on the German Police,” said the British Intelligence Agent” (p 48). The intensity of A Toast To Tomorrow comes from German officials slowly starting to question Hambledon. They can’t find evidence of him being a soldier, or even German. The more they question the more Tommy Hambledon is in danger of being exposed. He needs to run but the question is when is it too late?

Author fact: Adelaide Oke Manning died from throat cancer.

Book trivia: the English title for A Toast to Tomorrow is Pray Silence.

Book Lust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Intriguing Novels” (p 124).

Love Songs From a Shallow Grave

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Cotterill, Colin. Love Songs From a Shallow Grave. New York: SoHo Press, 2010.

Reason read: I started this series in May 2016 in honor of Laos and Rocket Day. It’s with mixed emotions that I announce this is the last book on my list. While the series goes on for me, it ends here.

Dr. Siri is just trying to watch a movie with his lovely wife, Madame Daeng, when he is rudely called away to examine the naked body of a young female security officer found in a sauna with an epee through the heart. In quick succession two more women are found murdered in the same manner. Dr. Siri can’t just be the national (and reluctant) coroner. He needs to find out who did this before the wrong man is condemned in public court. There is one problem, Dr. Siri is the only one who believes they have the wrong man and he’s locked up in a Cambodian prison.

It is always great when a series has strong supporting characters that only get stronger with each installment. Madame Daeng, Inspector Phosy, and best friend Civilai are back.. Even Mr. Geung, Dr. Siri’s assistant, is in the action. We learn in this installment that he gets his hair permed by Nurse Dtui.

Quotes I liked or laughed at: “To find a young crocodile with a good mind among the flock of flamingos was a rare delight” (p 8) and “Not knowing what’s going on makes my teeth curl with frustration” (p 35). Here’s a couple of not so funny ones to make you think: “Hungry people made poor environmentalists” (p 70) and “And what you don’t find you don’t lose” (p 298). Right.

Author fact: What have I told you thus far about Colin Cotterill? I mentioned his website twice (because I love it so much). I also told you he lived in Thailand and has taught in Australia. New info: he has a wife named Jessi and has a bunch of dogs.

Book trivia: this is book seven of the Dr. Siri Paiboun series. However, there are four more not on my list. Boo.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Laos” (p 128). Sad to say that for the last time!

Merry Misogynist

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Cotterill, Colin. The Merry Misogynist. New York: SoHo Press, 2009.

Reason read: to continue the series started in May for Laos Rocket Day.

To bring everyone up to speed: The year is 1978 and Dr. Siri Paiboun is 73, soon to be 74. He has married 66 year old Madame Daeng, a noodle shop owner. When we first connect with Siri and Daeng they are trying to outsmart the Department of Housing. The overbearing department is after Siri for living with Madame Daeng instead of in his own, government issued house. His own home is filled to the gills with wayward characters, a puppet master, a widow with two kids, two supposedly reformed prostitutes, a supposedly nonpracticing monk, a blind beggar and his granddaughter and let’s not forget the two twin babies Siri offered to look after from the last book, Curse of the Pogo Stick . But, that’s the least of Siri’s problems. A serial killer prowls the neighborhood, looking for his 6th wife to kill. He has connections to Vientiane which makes him a problem. Siri can’t resist playing wannabe detective.
All of the usual suspects are back (including Siri’s dead dog, Saloop!). Nurse Dtui helps Siri play detective in an effort to find missing Crazy Man Rajid and catch the serial killer.

One of the best parts of The Merry Misogynist was getting to know Madame Daeng better. She and Siri are meant for one another. She shares his sense of humor and wit. He has definitely met his match in this woman!

Lines I liked, “His accent was so think, it would have stuck to the wall if you’d thrown it” (p 62), “If a hornbill with a machete had run across Siri in the bush and hacked him to death, he would have succumbed in good grace: a victim of the survival of the fittest rule” (p 109), and two lines together: “‘Dtui, get my gun,’ said Siri. Siri didn’t have a gin but Dtui ran off to get it anyway” (p 117). Funny!

Author fact: I can’t remember if I mentioned this before but Cotterill has his own website here.

Book trivia: this should be a movie, but it isn’t. Not yet, at least!

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter simply called “Laos” (p 128).

September Slipped Away

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September was a cool month. On the 10th I ran a half marathon (2:10:16), was able to get to Monhegan (and introduce the island to some new people), and get to a lot of reading:

  1. Curse of the Pogo Stick by Colin Cotterill
  2. Life and Death in Shanghai by Nien Cheng
  3. Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
  4. Consul’s Wife by W.T. Tyler
  5. Tears of Autumn by Charles McCarry (AB)
  6. Life and Death of Edwin Mullhouse by Steven Millhauser
  7. Four-Story Mistake by Elizabeth Enright
  8. Best Game Ever by Mark Bowden
  9. The Trial by Franz Kafka
  10. Which Side Are You On? by Elaine Harger (ER)
  11. Which Side Are You On? by George Ella Lyon (for fun)

AB = Audio book
ER = Early review

Tear of Autumn

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McCarry, Charles. The Tears of Autumn. Read by Stefan Rudnicki. Oregon: Blackstone Audio, 2005.

Reason read: Cold War ended in September.

Paul Christopher is back; Christopher, the the cool-as-a-cucumber, jet-setting, incorruptible CIA secret agent. This time he is trying to convince his superiors he knows who killed John F. Kennedy and why. But, is this a story of revenge or not? When Vietnam’s president, Ngo Dinh Diem, is assassinated Christopher can’t help but think there is a connection when JFK is murdered just three weeks later in Texas. Was Oswald just a switch someone far-reaching flicked on? Christopher seeks the truth and along the way puts the people he cares about in danger (especially a love interest, of course). While the plot is predictable and the characters, typecast, I enjoyed Christopher’s next adventure.

Author fact: McCarry also wrote The Last Supper and Shelley’s Heart both of which are on my list.

Book trivia: this is part of a seven-book series but I don’t think you would be missing anything if you didn’t read them one right after the other or out of order.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Cold War Spy Fiction” (p 61).