Spent a week with my momma at her lovely home deep in the middle of nowhere at the end of October. Limited internet access, no phone, no TV. Lots of peaceful quiet, books, knitting, and plenty of trails perfect for gentle hikes. (Or not so gentle hikes, but we’re talking about me, an octogenarian, and a deaf 14 year old dog. So we keep it gentle.) Basically, heaven. Except for that one night when I was outside for Tarzan’s last pee and a snorty-snuffle from just outside the circle from my phone’s flashlight scared the actual tuna salad out of me. Tarzan was unbothered until I practically teleported the two of us up the steps onto the deck then back inside the house where there were definitely no bears. Anyway, the reading was good and the livin’ was easy.
Then back to the whirlwind of life of November, complete with snow and a business trip to Chicago. Where there was also snow. Hurrah? On to the books.
The Summer Tree – The Fionavar Tapestry Book One by Guy Gavriel Kay. A co-worker of mine recommends this trilogy at every opportunity, so when I was selecting books for a week off-the-grid and saw it was available into my downloads it went. Five students at the University of Toronto attend an event on campus, meet an unusual pair of travellers, and then find themselves swept up into a coming war in the parallel (?) world of Fionavar. The world building is just *chef’s kiss* really excellent, and it makes for a fantastic fantasy adventure.
A Scandal in Scarlet by Vicky Delany. A perfectly fine cozy genre mystery that has less of the usual warmth and coziness.
Farewell Blues by Maggie Robinson. Kinda forgettable to be honest. Writing this blurb less than two months after reading, and I don’t remember it all that well despite having reread the online summary. So there ya go.
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix. A ridiculous and entirely creepy-fun mash-up of like a Reese’s Book Club pick + a trashy 1980’s grocery store tabloid + true crime + Harlequin Romance bodice ripper. I give it an A.
Grave Secret by Charlaine Harris. Another highly readable novel with likably creepy characters, a whiff of the supernatural, and a good helping of humour from modern Southern Gothic queen, Charlaine Harris. She of True Blood, Sookie Stackhouse, etc. If you dig her other novels, and I do, you’ll enjoy this one too.
The Wandering Fire – The Fionavar Tapestry Book Two by Guy Gavriel Kay. I probably should have waited a little longer before reading the second book in the series. I was feeling a little tired of it by the time I finished, and I don’t think that’s fair. But anyway, it didn’t turn me off the series. I will read the third… eventually.
The Appeal by Janice Hallett. I paused at moments while reading this novel to just appreciate how much I was enjoying it. It’s a modern epistolary novel, with the story meted out in chunks through emails between two young lawyers who have been given a bunch of evidence to digest and analyze with fresh eyes, but little additional context. So good.
Persuasion by Jane Austen. In this classic, the protagonist is an actual full-on common-sensical adult (a practically antique thirtyish!), past her best years and best looks – as everyone thinks, including herself – until she finds herself with another chance at true love. A classic for good reason.
Poppy Done to Death by Charlaine Harris. I always forget about the Aurora Teagarden mysteries when I think about Charlaine Harris (see directly above!) because they don’t fit my conception of her as an author. These are straight-ahead cozy genre novels with perhaps just a smidge more spice than conventional. I enjoy them too.
It Begins in Betrayal by Iona Whishaw. Another in a series I’m enjoying a fair bit, this installment takes main character Lane away from central British Columbia and back to her home country of England. She’s following Darling, her police inspector boyfriend, who has been summoned to London to face charges regarding something that happened in WW2, a few years previous. It’s all official secrets and former spies and skullduggery, and I’m here for it.
Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty. Really suspenseful, really enjoyable. Like Ms Moriarty’s other novels I’ve read (Big Little Lies, Nine Perfect Strangers), I’m sure it will translate beautifully to the small screen and I look forward to watching it. Is Nicole Kidman gonna play the eldest sibling or the mom though? She’s just about exactly in between their ages. Note: I have no idea if this is really in the works and Google has no info, but I can’t believe it’s not.
The Verifiers by Jane Pek. With a unique premise – the main character works in an agency that gets hired to verify that people’s dating profiles are true – this novel hooked me from the outset. It turns into a mystery (Was the sudden death of one of their clients a murder? If so, whodunnit? And why is the protagonist being blocked from investigating?) which, as you know, is very much my cup of tea.
Something to Hide by Elizabeth George. I mean, Elizabeth George novels are always going to be good. I don’t really feel like this one is up with her very best though. It felt very effortful as I read. Maybe because the community that is being investigated (Nigerian immigrants and first-gen Brits living in London) and the issue being investigated (female genital mutilation) is so very removed from the world of Lynley and Simon and Helen. Yet, they all become involved “coincidentally.” YMMV, let me know what you think!
Memphis by Tara M. Stringfellow. Hard to read from an emotional point of view for me, but the characters, setting, and intergenerational storytelling kept me to the end. It is a debut novel released this year, so I’ll definitely be watching for what’s next.
My Summer Darlings by May Cobb. This novel packs in a lot of details that could be ingredients in a scorcher of a read, but never really comes together. It’s like the author kept a bedside table list of ideas for creepy psychological thrillers, then challenged herself to pack them all into a single book – whether or not they made sense, moved the plot ahead or what. Or perhaps, and I am actually leaning to this hypothesis, it was written by an AI platform that had ingested every single buzzy popular movie or book in the last decade and was instructed to fill the novel-to-movie pipeline with the next big thing.
