Tag: mystery

Return of Sherlock Holmes

gr4c5Leave a comment

Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: The Return of Sherlock Holmes. Doubleday & Company, 1930.

Reason read: I am still working my way through Sherlock Holmes. I obviously took a little break, but now I am back.

The Return of Sherlock Holmes is comprised of thirteen adventures. There is a certain formula to Doyle’s writing. Someone is always trying to scam, blackmail, or extort something from someone else. Clients come to Holmes when Scotland Yard thinks the case is out of their league. Scandal, public embarrassment, or out and out trickery is usually the name of the game. Sherlock is always the master of disguises; a chameleon of identity. He is always seeing details others commonly miss. Confessional: I got a little tired of his smug attitude. I love love Watson, though.

  • “Adventures of the Empty House”
  • “Adventure of the Norwood Builder”
  • “Adventure of the Dancing Men”
  • “Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist”
  • “Adventure of the Priory School”
  • “Adventure of Black Peter”
  • “Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton”
  • “Adventure of the Six Napoleons”
  • “Adventure of the Three Students”
  • “Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez”
  • “Adventure of the Missing Three-Quarter”
  • “Adventure of the Abbey Grange”
  • “Adventure of the Second Stain”

Author fact: Doyle tried to kill off Sherlock but his fans wouldn’t let him.

Book trivia: The Return of Sherlock Holmes was published in 1905 as a collection. The stories came out individually from 1903 – 1904.

Nancy said: Pearl never mentions The Return of Sherlock Holmes because it is within The Complete Sherlock Holmes.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 117).

Bluest Blood

gr4c5Leave a comment

Roberts, Gillian. The Bluest Blood. Ballantine Books, 1998.

Reason read: to finish the series started in July. Yes, I definitely took some time off from reading the series.

Amanda Pepper is back! This time she is on the case for a different kind of mystery. Pitted against the Moral Ecologists, a group hellbent on censorship, Amanda must stop them from ruining her ability to teach English. The plot thickens early on when Reverend Harvey Spiers, leader of the Moral Ecologists, shows up at a fundraiser hosted by Edward and Theodora Roederer. The Roederers are wealthy staunch supporters of free speech and annually give a ton of money to the community, including Amanda’s prep school. First red flag? Spier’s son and Roederer’s son are close friends. Second? Jake and Griffin are in Amanda’s class. Both are angsty teens with family issues that go beyond morality and wealth. Of course, the protesting gets out of hand and someone winds up dead. But it wouldn’t be an Amanda Pepper mystery if Amanda didn’t find herself in a wee bit of danger herself.
The ongoing joke is that Amanda does not know Mackenzie’s full name so whenever she goes to introduce him to someone new she stumbles. Why she can’t call him “C.K.” is beyond me.
As an aside, the details are a little dated. This was written in an age when photoshopping the Mona Lisa with a scowl was good fun. Technology has come a long way since the days of putting grins on dogs.

Line I liked, “Sometimes a speaker needs a soliloquy” (p 74).

Playlist: the Three Tenors

Author fact: Gillian Roberts, also known as Judith Greber, wrote a bunch of Amanda Pepper books, but this is my last one for the Challenge.

Book trivia: Sasha and Amanda’s mom are repeat characters.

Nancy said: Pearl mentions Bluest Blood first when naming good Amanda Pepper mysteries.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: the Literary Midwest (Pennsylvania)” (p 31).

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

gr4c5Leave a comment

Roberts, Gillian. How I Spent My Summer Vacation. Ballantine Books, 1994.

Reason read: to continue the series started in July in honor of Philadelphia’s Global Fusion Festival.

What is a mild mannered prep school teacher doing in seedy Atlantic City trying to solve a mystery? In a nutshell, photographer and fun girl, Sasha, is trouble and in trouble. Even though she is one of Amanda’s best friends, on her own she is a handful. Twice divorced, 6′ tall with wild raven-dark hair and bad choices in men. What could possibly go wrong? Add Atlantic City, gambling, crazy people, and a dead body to the mix and you have a whole new Amanda Pepper mystery. Sasha convinces Amanda to take a vacation with her to Atlantic City while she is on a photography assignment. Once there somehow she and Amanda are tangled up in the death of a well-liked financier who finds money for the elderly and underserved. Tangled because Jesse Reese was found in Sasha’s and there is a witness who saw the two of them together entering the room…
The breadcrumbs of clues: Frankie gave Sasha the upgraded hotel room, hoping for a date. Does he have something to do with it? Homeless lady babbles about losing her fortune. Who is she and why does she latch on to Amanda? In truth, I wanted Jesse to have faked his own death. That would have been a fun twist.
While Amanda is trying to clear Sasha of homicide charges, she is also trying to detangle her relationship with her cop. Mackenzie follows Amanda in hopes of talking about their relationship. She spends more time playing detective than figuring out where her heart is hiding.

Confessional: I spend a long weekend at Atlantic City not that long ago. the boardwalk of old is barely recognizable. The wicker furniture on wheels used to ferry tourists from place to place has long been replaced by extra long and extra speedy golf carts.

Lines I liked, “I tried to become Sasha, to add four inches to my height and geometric increments to my self-confidence” (p 27), “Cats are pragmatists, not romantics” (p 92),

Author fact: Gillian Roberts real name is Judith Greber.

Book trivia: How I Spent Last Summer is a very quick read and can be read independent of other Amanda Pepper mysteries.

Playlist: Harry Belafonte, “Sunrise, Sunset”, and Cher.

Nancy said: Pearl said it was always a pleasure to read the Amanda Pepper series.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: The Literary Midwest (Pennsylvania)” (p 25).

Caught Dead in Philadelphia

gr4c5Leave a comment

Roberts, Gillian. Caught Dead in Philadelphia. Charles Scribner Press,

Reason read: another chance to celebrate the Global Fusion Festival in Philadelphia.

Meet Amanda Pepper, a thirty year old school teacher who just broke up with yet another boyfriend…much to her mother’s chagrin. When Amanda is not trying to quit boyfriends or smoking she is stumbling into deadly crime scenes. Only Liza Nichols is no stranger to Amanda. She was a coworker of Amanda’s and engaged to wealthy, influential senator-hopeful, Hayden Cole. She was also found murdered on Ms. Pepper’s living room floor. And that’s how the trouble started.
When it comes to the antics of Amanda Pepper, you have to let reality go. There are things she does and says that I cannot imagine a sane person doing or saying. The misconception that she and Liza were very close, for example. Mrs. Nichols, Liza’s own mother, was convinced Liza and Amanda were the best of best friends. Future mother-in-law, Mrs. Cole, thought they had been friends since childhood and knew each other as intimately as sisters. Why doesn’t Amanda think that these misconceptions are super weird and why isn’t she telling the police about them? As an aside, my doctor assumed I took an antibiotic before surgery and when I didn’t correct her (because I hadn’t), it bugged me for days.
When a second murder victim is found, again with ties to Amanda, she is assigned police protection in the form of a hunky date-material detective. Her sister and mother salivate at the thought of them as a couple.
Confessional: when they solve the crimes I wish Pepper had put two and two together sooner. Her knowledge of Shakespeare’s Macbeth would have cracked the case wide open if she had just done her homework.

Line I liked, “That primitive center of me still believed that saying things made them possible, and silence kept them from happening” (p 123).

Author fact: let Google autofill Gillian’s name and your first result will be a UTF athlete with flaming red hair. A proper search reveals that Ms. Roberts was born in Philly.

Book trivia: Caught Dead in Philadelphia is the first Amanda Pepper mystery. There are many others, but I am only reading three. The Bluest Blood and How I Spent My Summer Vacation are up next.

Nancy said: Pearl said Roberts writes perfect books for cozy mystery fans. She’s not wrong.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Philadelphia” (p 180).

Broken Soul

gr4c5Leave a comment

Krompinger, Keith. Broken Soul. Archway Publishing, 2023.

Reason read: someone practically threw this at me and dared me to read it.

Very. Dramatic. Language. I dare you to count the number of pages that do NOT include references to violence, sex, drugs, devils or demons. You will lose count because if someone isn’t being tortured or raped, he or she is dying a very violent (and very graphic) death. But, wait. There’s more. The women have lots of crimson hair, they must be undressed and stared at for a little while before they are “sexually raped”, tortured, and finally put out of their misery with a brutal murder. Oh wait. I forgot to mention the cannibalism. People being eaten alive on some strange Caribbean island.
Unfortunately, the violence is laid on so thick there is very little character development. As each person met a horrible fate, I didn’t care. Go ahead. Dress the women in weird outfits before painting their bodies with symbols, raping them and then eating them alive, body part by body part. I shrugged off the rape and torture as if was a breakfast scene with pancakes and eggs. I didn’t know any victim well enough to want them to live. Even when someone had their jugular bitten out, I shrugged with indifference. I couldn’t tell you the plot if I tried other than to say some guy is haunted by his wife’s murder. He is being called to revenge by a demon (or something with red eyes in the mirror) while his teenage daughter has her own coping mechanisms with drugs.

Here are my questions: there is a scene when the “good guys” enter a building with guns ablazing. They kill four people with a double barreled shotgun, but afterwards two people are heard talking upstairs. Are those people deaf? Didn’t they hear the blasts? Wouldn’t they be yelling or running or yelling while running?

Is it normal for someone to rush to a crime scene with enthusiasm? Cops are fueled by adrenaline, yes. But enthusiasm?

Do the women have mirrors in their jungle captivity? Because they all seem to know about the paint marked on their faces.

Poison Heart Death Club. Is that anything like Lonely Hearts Club Band?

I don’t really understand the timeline: 10/12/10 5am, 3:30am, 11:45am. 11/8/05 11:23pm, 2:45pm, 6:24pm. Is this still 11/8/05? The hours ticking by down give me a sense of suspense, but this timeline is all over the place. I lost track.

How often do you hear someone say the word ravished?

What is a Kailua drink?

Why “parts of her heart” in her mouth? Why not her whole heart stuffed in her mouth and only parts could be seen?

The characters do a lot of smirking no matter what the situation.

Confessional: I left Broken Soul in a recycling bin in New York City.

Sacrifice

gr4c5Leave a comment

Bolton, S. J. Sacrifice. Minotaur Books, 2009.

Reason read: This is awful, but I don’t remember why this is an April book.

It all starts when obstetrician Tora Hamilton finds a human body buried on her land. She is new to the Shetland islands off the coast of Scotland, but her husband’s people have lived here for generations. To think she was trying to bury a horse! What she finds instead is the body of a young woman who used to have red hair and appears to have given birth. Who is this woman and why is she on Tora’s land? To dig into the mystery of the buried woman is to reveal a scandal much bigger than a simple death. To dig into history of Shetland is to uncover an ancient secret that is better left for dead. Despite the danger, Tora cannot let the mystery be. The more she uncovers the more she questions her marriage of five years, her job, and her future. Why has her husband stayed away from his homeland for twenty years and does her boss look so much like her father-in-law?
While Tora had questions I had questions for her. What kind of person can shrug off a pig’s heart left on her kitchen table in the dead of night? What about crushed strawberries in the basement? Are those normal occurrences in Shetland? Wouldn’t it drive her crazy that her keys go missing for days? As more strange events start to pile up I questioned Tora’s judgement. That was exactly what Bolton wanted me to do.

Line I liked, “At the end of the day, if you believe something deeply enough, it becomes a kind of truth” (p 313). Amen to that.

Book trivia: because Sacrifice is translated into English some of the sentences are quirky. Case in point: “why the hell was me going back to Shetland?” (p 210).

Nancy said: Pearl caught my attention when she called Sacrifice “creepy and riveting.”

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

Fear Itself

gr4c5Leave a comment

Mosely, Walter. Fear Itself. Read by Don Cheadle. Hachett Book Group, 2003.

Reason read: to finish the series started in January in honor of Mosely’s birth month.

Fearless Jones is at it again, getting his friend Paris Minton in trouble. Since we last saw Minton he was trying to rebuild his life after his bookstore was burned to the ground and he was beaten and shot at in Fearless Jones. Now, in Fear Itself Minton has been able to rebuild his bookstore and get back to a quiet life, thanks to a settlement from the last book. He still doesn’t want trouble, but yet Fearless soon finds a way to get Paris in the thick of it. This time, the wealthiest woman in Los Angeles is missing her nephew. She tricks Fearless into looking for him and Fearless pulls Minton into the mystery. You will meet a whole host of strange characters in Fear Itself. There are so many plot twists I almost needed a flow chart to keep everything straight.
Confessional: I want to sit across from Paris Minton and have him tell me stories about his collection of books.

Line I liked, “When you come right down to it, there’s nothing like a fire for putting the spunk back into a body” (p 41).

Author fact: I think Mosely’s other series featuring Easy Rawlins is more popular.

Playlist: Beethoven’s 5th.

Book trivia: This is actually trivia about the audio version – audio not only includes music, but the characters belch like a real performance.

Nancy said: Pearl didn’t say anything specific about the Fearless series other than to say is was something Mosely wrote.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Walter Mosely: Too Good To Miss” (p 168).

Fearless Jones

gr4c5Leave a comment

Mosely, Walter. Fearless Jones. Little, Brown and Company, 2001.

Reason read: Walter Mosely was born in the month of January. Read in his honor.

Paris Minton ingeniously builds his used bookstore from discards and sales from local libraries. For a Negro to own his business in 1950s Watts, California, Minton knows he is an anomaly. What he also is, is unlucky. Soon after a beautiful woman in distress hides in his bookstore he is badly beaten and his store, burned to the ground. Who was the impossibly beautiful woman? Who would want to burn down his store and do that has anything to do with the men who beat him? There is only one thing to do, bail his good friend Fearless Jones out of prison and enlist him to solve the mystery. As Minton tells the story he builds the character of Fearless Jones through their friendship, setting up the character development in future stories.
When you read Walter Mosely expect crackling humor, fast paced action, racial truths, and lots of quick-jab violence.
As an aside, one of the things I like about Walter Mosely’s writing is that his characters use the bathroom. Not many authors include the details of common bodily functions.

Lines I liked, “Being challenged by the law was a rite of passenger for any Negro who wanted to better himself or his situation” (p 4), “The best cop I ever saw was the cop who wasn’t there” (p 87), and “These were men who had lived with Satan before coming to God, and they were still willing to venture over to the wrong side of holiness if the situation demanded it” (p 227).

Author fact: I have twelve Mosely books on my Challenge list, including two nonfiction contributions.

Book trivia: Fearless Jones is the first book in the Fearless Jones series.

Setlist: Louis Armstrong, Billie Holliday, and Pat Boone.

Nancy said: Pearl included Fearless Jones as part of the Fearless Jones series. She didn’t say anything beyond that about the book.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Walter Mosely: Too Good To Miss” (p 168).

Black River

gr4c5Leave a comment

Ford, G.M. Black River. William Morris, 2002.

Reason read: to continue the series started last month in honor of New Jersey becoming a state.

This mystery continues to feature hard nosed Frank Corso. He’s a stoic reporter who happens to be a imposing tough guy. This time he is the only writer allowed into the courtroom during the murder trial of Nicholas Balagula, alleged gangster accused of killing 63 people. It’s the crime of the century in the form of faulty architecture of a hospital. At the same time, a murdered man is discovered buried in his truck by the side of a river. Is this murder related to Balagula’s trial and if so, how? The dead man was paying for his son’s expensive medical school on a blue collar salary. How? Was he on Balagula’s payroll? Corso only gets involved when his former lover, Meg Dougherty, has an accident so life threatening Corso doubts it was an accident at all. Someone wants Meg dead. All clues lead Corso back to Balagula in round about ways.

Author fact: the G. M. stands for Gerald Moody. I have to wonder if he is related to the Moody family in Maine. You know, the ones with famous diner?

Book trivia: You could walk around Corso’s world just by taking note of the real-life landmarks Ford uses: Elliott Bay, Bainbridge, 7th Madison, Portage Bay, Montlake Cut, Union Bay, Lake Washington

Playlist: Chopin, Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds”, Otis Redding’s “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long”, Ricky Martin, Sarah McLachlan, Heart, and Barry Manilow.

Nancy said: Pearl did not say anything specific about Black River.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Living High in Cascadia” (p 148).

Black Path of Fear

gr4c5Leave a comment

Woolrich, Cornell. The Black Path of Fear. Ballantine Books, 1982.

Reason read: Woolrich was born in the month of December. Read in his honor.

To read a Woolrich mystery is to be pulled into a compelling, fast-paced drama that has you turning page after page after page to figure out what happens next. In Black Path of Fear, a chance meeting between a newly hired chauffeur and his mob boss’s beautiful wife sets the stage for a story of gangster vengeance and betrayal. Scotty steals Eva away from her marriage and together, they manage to escape to Havana, Cuba. They have escaped, but not undetected. Soon after their arrival, Eva is quietly and cleverly murdered. All evidence points to Scott. He bought the murder weapon hours earlier. Did he murder the gangster’s wife to avoid the jealous wrath of organized crime? Partnering with a mysterious woman primed for revenge herself, Scott is trapped in Havana. How to extricate himself from the crime is the mystery he and his new partner, Midnight, must solve. [As an aside, I loved the character of Midnight. She is the element of spice that makes the plot all that more delicious.]
Someone said the plot is fiendishly ingenious and I cannot help but agree. I read this in three sittings.
Details matter to me. There is a part of Woolrich’s narrative that did not make sense to me. Scott is chauffeuring Eva, Jordan and Roman to a nightclub. He observes how the three get into the car, saying, “they sat on each side of her.” Yet, when they arrive at their destination, he describes their exits as, “she had to alight before them, and they brought up the rear.” How is that possible? If she was in the middle, how did she get out before them? Would the men allow a woman in an evening gown to crawl over one of them? Unless they were in a limousine, which they were not…

Lines I liked, “It’s surprising how much easier it is to be ethical when you are well fed” (p 50) and “A change of opinion doesn’t make any noise” (p 57),

Author fact: I have six “Black” books of Woolrich’s on my Challenge list. I have only read two so far.

Book trivia: Black Path of Fear is a very short novel. Barely 160 pages, it is a quick read.

Playlist: “Jesus Loves Me”, “Amazing Grace”, and “Siboney”.

Nancy said: Pearl said all Woolrich’s stories are filled with “melodramatic plot twists, doom and dread” (Book Lust p 66).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Les Crimes Noir” (p 65). It also could have been included in the adjacent chapter called “Cuba Si!” (p 68). Just saying.

Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

gr4c5Leave a comment

Haddon, Mark. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Narrated by Jeff Woodman. Blackstone Audio, 2003.

Reason read: Christmas Present to Myself.

Everyone needs a Christopher John Francis Boone in their life. He is smart, funny, truthful, and loyal to the core. It doesn’t matter that his behavioral problems cause him to be violent when touched or that he hates the color yellow to the point of obstinance. Chris is, at heart, a really good kid who has been dealt a rough hand in life. His mother died of a heart attack and his father is his only family. So when Chris is accused of killing a dog with a garden fork, you feel for him. He knows he is innocent, but he can’t articulate this fact well enough to keep from being arrested and locked up. Eventually the police let him go, but that isn’t good enough for Chris and so begins his crusade to clear his name. The only way to really prove his innocence is to become a detective like Sherlock Holmes and discover who actually stabbed his neighbor’s poodle with a garden fork. This leads Chris down a path of more than one mystery. His journey is both courageous and inspiring.
Everything about The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is clever. The way Chris notices even the smallest detail to help him navigate his way through life. The way Chris uses the powers of deduction and reasoning to solve mysteries.
As an aside, it reminded me of Wonder by Palacio.

Author fact: Haddon won the Whitbread Book Award in 2003. He also won the Commonwealth Writers Prize and a Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize. He has a low-pri website here.

Book trivia: the title of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is based on the 1892 short story by Arthur Conan Doyle and all the chapters are in prime numbers.

Nancy said: Pearl called The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time “terrific” and “wonderful.”

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Maiden Voyages” (p 158) and again in the chapter called “Other People’s Shoes” (p 181).

Fury

gr4c5Leave a comment

Ford, G.M. Fury. Avon Books, 2001.

Reason read: Washington became a state in November. I needed a book for the Portland Public Library Reading Challenge for the categories of book with a one-word title and title with an emotion in it.

Meet former journalist and perpetual liar Frank Corso. He resembles Stephen Segal as a big man with a black ponytail. Meet Leanne Samples, another liar; only her lies occured under oath as a witness in a death row case. Together, with the fellow outcast and heavily tattooed photographer Meg Dougherty, they try to prove the innocence of a criminal on death row. What a bizarre group of characters. I had to ask myself if I would like any of them. We meet them six days before the execution of Walter Leroy Hines. He was convicted of murdering eight women based on the testimony of one woman who survived…you guessed it, liar Leanne Samples. Fury is a hour by hour, play by play of the unfolding drama. Can they save Hines or did he actually do it because Leanne recanted her recant. The only complaint I have about Fury is the fact that the twist at the end wasn’t a twist at all. As soon as the timeline started to count back up you know there is more to the story. Totally predictable.
One of the best things about Fury is the introduction to Washington state: the Elliott Bay, the Bainbridge Island ferry, Myrtle Edwards Park, Puget Sound, the spring rains that last until August. Is King County Jail on the corner of 5th and James?

I have to ask. Is it possible to tattoo someone from head to toe in 36 hours? I guess it is if the artist is crap…

Author fact: Ford died in 2021. He was 75 years old.

Book trivia: Fury starts a new series for Ford.

Playlist: Billy Preston’s “Nothin’ From Nothin'”, Doobie Brothers, Lynryrd Skynard’s “Sweet Home Alabama”, Del Shannon’s “Runnaway”, Rob Thomas and Carlos Santana’s “Smooth”, Hank Crawford and Jimmy McGriff’s “The Glory of Love”,

Nancy said: Pearl did not say anything specific about Fury.

BookLust twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Living High in Cascadia” (p 148).

Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

gr4c5Leave a comment

Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.

Reason read: It’s Sherlock.

Here are the short stories that make up The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes:

  • “Silver Blaze” – who killed a jockey and where is the famous horse, Silver Blaze?
  • “Yellow Face” – this was my favorite mystery of the book.
  • “Stock-broker’s Clerk” – What is a true connection and how can it be bought?
  • “The Gloria Scott” – a glimpse into Holmes’s past. We learn of a friendship that comes from a dog bite.
  • “Musgrave Ritual” – my favorite line came from this story, “Pistol practice should be an open air pasttime.” Amen to that.
  • “Reigate Puzzle” – holmes is supposed to be resting after an illness but cannot help getting involved with a murder mystery.
  • “Crooked Man”- it was at this point that I decided it would be exhausting to have a conversation with Shelock Holmes; to have all of his observations and elementary deductions punctuating his every sentence.
  • “Resident Patient” – Watson picks up on Sherlock’s method of deducation.
  • “Greek Interpreter” – it is revealed Sherlock Holmes has a brother, Mycroft. The two brothers share the same powers of deduction so a conversation with them would be twice as annoying.
  • “Naval Treaty” – we meet a college friend of Watson’s.
  • “Final Problem” – the story that makes everyone think Homes has died.

As an aside, what constitutes a fabulous forehead?

Author fact: Doyle studied medicine. I think that education helped his writing.

Book trivia: Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes is odd in the sense that it was published in 1893 with a ’94 date.

Nancy said: Memoirs of Sherlock Homes was so under the radar or Pearl since she only indexed The Complete Sherlock Holmes.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 123). Confessional: when I realized I would be reading more than one title within a single book, I started listing out the individual titles. For example, Remembrance of Things Passed has seven volumes (seven titles). I am listing each title separately because there is no way I can read Remembrance in its entirety in one month. So. Same with the Complete Sherlock Holmes. Pearl doesn’t mention each compilation of short stories or novel within but since that’s how I’m reading them, I decided to list them that way. My true confessional is that I have started to list out the short stories and this is where I have gotten myself confused. I haven’t been listing out the short stories in other collections, so why now?

Forty Words for Sorrow

gr4c5Leave a comment

Blunt, Giles. Forty Words for Sorrow. G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2001.

Reason read: Stories about serial killers scare me. Maybe it is the thought that once a person kills it can become easier and easier for them to do. Maybe Sting was onto something when he sang, “murder by numbers, it’s as easy as one, two, three.” For Halloween, I chose to read Forty Words for Sorrow. In addition, I needed a book with an emotion in the title for the Portland Public Library Reading challenge.

The title comes from a comparison to the Eskimo language. If there are forty words for snow, surely somewhere out there there are forty words that mean sorrow. John Cardinal is a flawed small town Canadian cop fixated on solving the mystery of the disappearance of a teenager girl. Maybe it was the thought of his own daughter that originally drove him, but Cardinal’s obsession to solve the case depleted department resources and ultimately got him transferred out of homicide and into the burglary and petty crimes division. Meanwhile, another teenager goes missing. Then another. Suddenly, Cardinal’s obsession, thirteen year old Katie Pine’s remains are found. Maybe he was onto something after all? Is this the work of a serial killer? This time John is back on the case with a rookie for a partner (is it Lise or Lisa?) who might be investigating him.
This all would be a typical story of a dedicated office with an I-told-you-so attitude but Cardinal is a cop with a complicated life and a dirty secret his partner is determined to uncover. Can he solve the crime(s) before his personal life crashes down around him? His daughter is attending Yale on illegal funds, his wife’s mental instability has landed her in an expensive in-patient hospital, and yet another individual has been found murdered. John asks again, is there a serial killer operating out of the tiny town of Algonquin Bay? Can Cardinal close the case before his colleagues close in on him?
Not a spoiler alert: I appreciate that Blunt leaves the ending open. Cardinal’s crimes are not wrapped up in an all-is-forgiven-because-you-are-a-hero bow. There is room for Cardinal to make a comeback and face his demons.

Author fact: Giles Blunt and I share a birthday.

Book trivia: this could have been a movie.

Playlist: Backstreet Boys, Tupac Shakur, Puff Daddy, Aerosmith, Madonna, Pretenders, Bryan Adams, Neil Young, “Good Morning Little School Girl”, Bach, Pearl Jam, Whitney Houston, Celine Dion, “Abide with Me”, Rolling Stones, Anne Murray, and Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now”.

Nancy said: Pearl said Blunt’s writing is gripping and that Forty Words for Sorrow was one of her favorites.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Canada, O Canada” (p 51).

Mrs. Westerby Changes Course

gr4c5Leave a comment

Cadell, Elizabeth. Mrs. Westerby Changes Course. William Morrow & Company, Inc., 1968.

Reason read: July is Ice Cream Month. Ice cream makes most people happy. Mrs. Westerby Changes Course is supposed to be a feel-good book even though it is a little dark.

I think I would like Miss Gail Sinclair if I were to meet her as a real person. As a secretary for a London publishing company she exudes humor and vitality, even if her offer to chauffeur one of the publishing company’s newest author to a cottage in the English countryside turns more than a little crazy. Gail never dreamed she would find herself caught up in a dark drama; let alone come out of it with a budding romance. Recently widowed Mrs. Anita Stratton needs someone to accompany her to her former sister-in-law’s cottage. There, she hopes to collect her family’s heirloom furniture from her husband’s sister, Mrs. Westerby. It’s a strange situation. Widow owns the furniture. Deceased man’s sister owns the cottage. Keep in mind, this is in an era of ear trumpets and good graces. Polite decorum is a must, yet sister-in-law Mrs. Westerby is a loud and obnoxious individual who is always showing up wherever Gail and Mrs. Stratton seem to be. This is not how Gail knows her to be. Tagging behind Mrs. Westerby is her godson, Julian. Why does he need to keep an eye on Mrs. Westerby and why does she act so strange around Mrs. Stratton? The story gallops along so readers won’t have to wait too long to find out.

Author fact: Cadell has written a bunch of books. I am reading three for the Challenge: The Corner Shop, The Toy Sword, and of course, Mrs. Westerby Changes Course.

Book trivia: the cover art for Mrs. Westerby Changes Course combines humor and society. Cute doesn’t even begin to describe it.

Nancy said: Pearl called Cadell a writer of gentle reads.

Book Lust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Cozies” (p 50).