It’s time once again for my
scintillating interesting
brief book reviews!
1. The Long
Way Home (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #10), by Louise
Penny. Happily retired in the village of Three Pines, Armand Gamache,
former Chief Inspector of Homicide with the Sûreté du Québec, has found a peace
he'd only imagined possible. On warm summer mornings he sits on a bench holding
a small book, The Balm in Gilead, in his large hands. "There is a balm in
Gilead," his neighbor Clara Morrow reads from the dust jacket, "to
make the wounded whole." While Gamache doesn't talk about his wounds and
his balm, Clara tells him about hers. Peter, her artist husband, has failed to
come home… She wants Gamache's help to find him… The journey takes them further
and further from Three Pines, to the very mouth of the great St. Lawrence
river. To an area so desolate, so damned, the first mariners called it The land
God gave to Cain. And there they discover the terrible damage done by a
sin-sick soul.
The Bug Says: I
listened to the audio version of this book. I love the narrator, and as I said
on the last Book Review Tuesday, I could listen to Louise Penny’s characters
talk about cheese all day & be perfectly happy. Her style might not appeal
to everyone, but I always feel like I’m coming home when I read an Inspector
Gamache book. I’m thinking of re-reading all of them before the next one comes
out! I gave this book five stars.
2. The Ice
Princess (Fjällbacka #1), by Camilla Läckberg. Returning to her
hometown after the funeral of her parents, writer Erica Falck finds a community
on the brink of tragedy. The death of her childhood friend, Alex, is just the
beginning. Her wrists slashed, her body frozen in an ice cold bath, it seems that
she has taken her own life. Erica conceives a memoir about the beautiful but
remote Alex, one that will answer questions about their lost friendship. While
her interest grows to an obsession, local detective Patrik Hedström is
following his own suspicions about the case. But it is only when they start
working together that the truth begins to emerge about the small town with a
deeply disturbing past.
The Bug Says: I
listened to this one on audio too – which is good because the book is set in
Sweden, & all the Swedish names would have been hard for me to keep
straight in print! I had read books 3 & 4 of the series & decided that
I wanted to start from the beginning. I don’t know why I enjoy them so much –
they’re police procedurals wherein a small town police department has to solve
murders. I think that the characters are so well written – there’s humor and a really
great turn of phrase (much better than I’m able to convey, obviously – ha!). I
gave it five stars too.
3. Still
Midnight (Alex Morrow #1), by
Denise Mina. It's the case that could make DS Alex Morrow's career, it would
make any salivate. A home invaded in the dead of night, deep in the heart of
the cosy suburbs; a hard working family at the heart of it and a vulnerable old
man taken hostage. It's high profile, a black-and-white case and it shouldn't
be hard to solve ...
The Bug Says: As
you may or may not recall, I read the 2
nd book in this series
first & really enjoyed it. I wasn’t able to get the audio version of this
book (I missed the Scottish narrator), and for some reason I took my own sweet
time reading it. (I see from Goodreads that it took me 26 days to finish!) But
once I got into the meat of the story I really really enjoyed it (yes, broken
record here). She’s another writer who has a lovely turn of phrase, often about
a grim reality. I gave it 4 stars (just because of how long it took me to get
into it).
4. The Job (Fox
and O'Hare #3), by Janet Evanovich & Lee Goldberg. Charming con man
Nicolas Fox and dedicated FBI agent Kate O'Hare secretly take down world’s most-wanted
and untouchable felons. Next job: Violante, the brutal leader of a global
drug-smuggling empire. The FBI doesn’t know what he looks like, where he is, or
how to find him, but Nick knows his tastes in gourmet chocolate. From
Nashville to Lisbon back alleys, from Istanbul rooftops to Thames, they chase
clues to lookalike thefts. Pitted against a psychopathic bodyguard holding Kate
hostage and a Portuguese enforcer getting advice from an ancestor's pickled
head, they again call driver Willie for the ship, actor Boyd for one-eyed
Captain Bridger, special effects carpenter Tom, her father Jake - retired
Special Forces, and his talent - machete-wielding Somali pirate Billy Dee. This
could be their biggest job - if they survive.
The Bug Says: Evanovich
is the author of the popular Stephanie Plum series, and this one is somewhat
similar, except that in this series
the woman is competent at her job. I love the humor in these books & the
fact that they don’t require a lot of thought – or time investment. I gave it
three stars.
5. Serial, the Podcast. Serial is a
podcast from the creators of
This American Life, and is hosted by
Sarah Koenig. Serial tells one story - a true story - over the course
of an entire season. Each season, we'll follow a plot and characters wherever
they take us. And we won’t know what happens at the end until we get there, not
long before you get there with us.
The Bug Says: OK,
so it’s not really a book, per se. But I listened to it instead of listening to
an audio book so I’m counting it. They’re planning to tell a different story
each season. This season the story was about a convicted murderer, Adnon Syed,
who may or may not be guilty. There are 12 episodes that you can download &
listen to. I’d been told that I would LOVE this podcast by a number of people,
but I stubbornly resisted until it was “assigned” for book club. And as
promised, I loved it! Which should not be a surprise since most of the books I
read have something to do with murder. I even gave it four stars on Goodreads,
but apparently seeing as how it’s not actually a book, Goodreads has since removed
it from their database. Ha!
Currently I’m listening to
Sycamore
Row, by John Grisham (just love the southern accent of the narrator),
and reading
The Cypher
(Guardians Inc. #1), by Julian Rosado-Machain.
The Cypher is my Kindle freebie for book club & it’s
surprisingly good! He needs an editor (grammar typos), but the story is pretty
interesting. Of course, I’m only 34% done, so who knows how it’ll turn out. I’ll
let you know in the next edition of Book Review Tuesday!
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