Love in a Nutshell by Janet Evanovich and Dorien Kelly

          This was a quick fun read – actually a listen as it was an audio book.  It was totally predictable, which was not a bad thing here. This book did not have any delusions of grandeur.  It was just a simple love story.

          Kate is Evanovich’s typical heroine - little ditzy, but determined and charming.  Matt is a good hero.  He is handsome, of course, a talented brewer of beers, a very successful businessman and all round nice guy. 

          Kate has decided, after her divorce, to turn her parent’s vacation home, called the Nutshell, into a bread and breakfast. The place needs extensive renovation, the removal of thousands of bees, cleansing of mold and serious refurnishing. Kate’s resources are limited and she is racing against time to get the B&B up and running before the place goes into foreclosure.

          The story starts with Kate arriving at Matt’s microbrewery, The Depot, to demand a job.  She believes she was unjustly fired from her last position due to a batch of skunky Depot beer, and Matt owes her a job. Matt is not really planning on doing any hiring, but is intrigued.  He has been having a run of bad luck lately that he is beginning to suspect might not be accidental. Kate agrees to do some snooping for him, and the bonus he promises her for finding the culprit will bring the mortgage on the Nutshell current and pay some of the renovation bills.

          It quickly becomes clear that the bad luck really is sabotage as the perpetrators become increasingly violent and dangerous. Matt wants Kate out of the Depot, and harm’s way, but she is determined to earn the bonus she needs by finding out who is responsible.

          Figuring out who-done-it is as easy as thinking about who has the most to gain by running Matt out of business. How the damage is being accomplished is a bit trickier to determine. And, Kate does finally figure it out, mostly because she runs into the guy in the midst of starting a fire. But her mission is accomplished.  Her bonus is earned and as if that is not enough, she also gets the handsome brew master!

          I listened to this one on audio, so it took several days to get through the whole thing.  This probably would have been a one day read in book form. But it was fun. And, my favorite character is Stella.  If you want to know why, you’ll just need to read the book.

The Drop by Michael Connelly

         Harry Bosch #15

          This is the latest in Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch series. Harry is a detective in LA’s cold case squad.  One morning he is brought into the boss’s office and given a case that could be a real hot potato.  A nineteen-year-old girl was raped and murdered nearly two decades earlier. A retest of the DNA in the case has come up with a match – a man who has done time for another sex offense. The kicker is that at the time of the young girl’s murder, this sex offender was eight years old. Has the evidence been mishandled? Was there an error at the lab? This case could blow up in the department’s face.

          As Harry and his partner begin the careful investigation of the case in light of the confusing DNA results, they get thrown another curve. They are asked to take over a hot case, one with lots of “high jingo” or administrative and political interest. A man has landed in the parking lot of a hotel.  The question is whether he jumped himself or was helped over the railing of his seventh floor room. The man is the son of a city councilman, one who has long had it in for Harry Bosch.  But Harry believes that everybody counts or nobody counts and the councilman knows Harry will not let the case rest till the truth has been uncovered.

          As Harry and his partner begin the even more delicate investigation of the councilman’s son’s death, it begins to look like a murder to get revenge on the councilman.  Then it starts to look more like a suicide that was helped along by the son’s despondence over his father’s corruption. Harry’s final decision is suicide. And the councilman, who is facing reelection within weeks, is furious.  He is also adamant that he is not corrupt.  He gives Harry a photocopy of a phone message that he claims proves his innocence.  Harry says it is not enough to prove anything, but pockets the paper anyway.

          And then Harry returns the dead girl, whose reinvestigation was so rudely interrupted by the high jingo suicide case.

          Harry carefully follows the leads, determining that the DNA of the eight-year-old is not on the murdered girl’s body because he was involved in her death, but because he was another of the perpetrator’s victims. With the help of a predator, a monster is arrested. And, before all is said and done, Harry chooses to foil a plot to murder the murderer.  Because, everybody counts or nobody counts.

Graceling by Kristin Cashore

          This is a Young Adult novel, the first in a series, which was recommended by one of the bloggers I follow, Jesi Lea Ryan, Diary of a Bibliophile. Graceling is a very good book, and may be the beginning of a very good series. I am not going to be the one to tell you, though. While there are certainly Young Adult novels that I really enjoy, I encountered most of them while I was a young adult myself.  I also enjoy fantasy novels, which this is, and it’s a pretty good fantasy also.  It’s just a little too young and the fantasy world is a little too formulaic for my tastes.

          Katsa is a young woman in a world where some people are “graced”. Being graced is rather like having a talent on overdrive. At the tender age of eight, Katsa defends herself instinctually and kills the predator stalking her. From that point forward, it is assumed that Katsa’s grace is killing.  As the niece of the king, she quickly becomes his executioner. But she is smart and motivated to help others and really, really dislikes being used to intimidate, hurt and kill the king’s enemies. She finally develops the maturity and insight to realize that she holds the real power here, not the king. She refuses to do his bidding and leaves the kingdom.

          But she does not leave alone. A young man, Po, has come to her uncle’s kingdom searching for his kidnapped grandfather.  When Po leaves to continue his search, Katsa accompanies him. They come to know and trust each other as they face the perils of their journey. They both possess graces that everyone around them interprets incorrectly. Together they discover the true depths of their graces. They eventually fall in love.

          They determine who is behind the kidnapping of Po’s grandfather, and in their quest to discover and understand the motives for it; they encounter Bitterblue, a princess of a neighboring kingdom and Po’s cousin. She is grave peril, and Katsa and Po must risk everything to save her and expose the evil that is spreading outward from her kingdom.  Grandfather is rescued. Bitterblue is crowned queen, and the young lovers return to their cabin in the mountains to await the next installment in their story.

          This really is a good story. It is just directed at too young an audience to keep my interest. By all means give it a try, and encourage your kids to try it as well.

Sunrise Point by Robyn Carr

               Virgin River #19

               Sunrise Point is another quick, fun read from Robyn Carr’s Virgin River series.  Nora appeared a couple of books ago and she and her two young daughters quickly became a part of the fabric of life in town. So it was no surprise when her story came along.

               She was discovered, destitute with two babies, living in a derelict house that had no heat in the midst of a major blizzard.  The town rallied around her, got her warm and fed, and shored up the house. Soon she had a part time job and could at least manage to keep her small family fed.

               At the start of Sunrise Point, she is reading a help wanted poster for apple pickers at the orchard three miles outside of town. She is determined to get a job there. She bums a ride down to the orchard to apply.  The owner’s grandson, who is handling the hiring, takes one look at her and sends her on her way.  She is too young and small and weak-looking to be an apple picker. His grandmother, however, takes one look, sees shades of herself as a young woman, and pulls rank, informing Tom that Nora is to be given a chance.

               Nora grabs the opportunity and runs with it. But she is aware that Tom doesn’t really want her there…at first. She finds him very attractive, but knows there is another woman in the picture (classy, sophisticated and absolutely intimidating to Nora).  And, Tom is hesitant to take on a ready-made family, but not so hesitant that he is willing to keep his distance from the feisty, independent woman working in his orchard.

               Through trials and tribulations and triumphs, Nora and Tom become closer. And, when faced with the possibility of losing Nora and the girls for good, Tom does the only thing he can.

               I liked this book. It’s not deep and there are no major twists or surprises, but it is very entertaining and has a happy ending. I’ll look forward to the next book in the series.

The Limpopo Academy of Private Detection by Alexander McCall Smith

               #1 Ladies’ Detective Agency #13

               I had a very hard time getting into this one.  I’ve heard such good things about this series, but I just didn’t get it. Perhaps it was because I had not read any of the earlier novels.  Perhaps because the culture portrayed in the book is so very foreign to me. I nearly gave it up after the end of chapter 3.  I still didn’t know what the mystery was going to be and I found it very confusing that they all call each other the same thing – Mma. 

               Mma would roughly translate to Mrs. in English.  And, the character used this form of address in nearly every sentence they spoke to each other.  I found the incessant repetition of this word very distracting.

                              “I had a very strange dream last night, Mma,” she said. “As I was saying.”

                        “Please tell me what it was, Mma,” said Mma Makutsi.

This made it difficult for me to read.  The sentences did not flow for me.

               Also, it wasn’t until chapter 11 or 12 that I finally discovered what the mystery was.  Perhaps I am too impatient, but that seemed like a very long time to wait before the point of the story came up.  And, meanwhile, there were a couple of side stories that seemed to take up a great deal of the volume of the tale, without adding much to it. The arrest and trial of one of the detective lady’s husband’s employees happens, and is told about in much detail.  But, I never figured out where those characters and that activity played into the mystery out at the orphan’s farm. Also, the other detective lady’s husband discovers he is being cheated by the contactor building his house. Once again, I’m not sure how that part of the tale added to the story. 

               The reason I kept reading was a vignette in which a mother is helping her child with his math homework.  He’s doing word problems which were also my nemesis. If a man can dig a ditch in one hour, how long will it take 3 men to dig a ditch?  I totally agreed with the kid that they’d get in each other’s way and it would undoubtedly take longer than an hour.  I figured any author with that tight a grasp on math was worth some more of my time, so I forged on.

               I won’t be reading any more of these books. I was disappointed. I had been looking forward to being delighted, but it just didn’t happen.

I've Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella

          Poppy is an idiot. Her friends are too ridiculous for words. I really struggled to get through the first chapters of this book. If the woman didn’t lie, cheat and routinely break the rules of civilized behavior, her life would be simpler, less stressful and easier to read about. And, the muscles in my eyes wouldn’t ache from all the rolling.

          I wrote the paragraph above at the end of chapter three intending to stop reading right there. However, I realized I did not have another book loaded on the Kindle yet, and since I was reading between calls at work, I couldn’t really go shopping for one right then. So, I decided to soldier on till the end of my shift.

          I got better – not great – but it became more readable as it went on. Poppy started making better decisions, stopped lying compulsively, spent far less time with her idiot friends and finally met a good guy.

          This is not a book I’ll ever read again, but it ended up being okay.

Betrayal by Danielle Steel

               A woman who seems to have it all discovers she’s been living in a house of cards.

               Successful film director Tallie Jones is at the peak of her career, surrounded by people who live to take care of her so she can concentrate on her work. Brigitte, her personal assistant and best friend for the last seventeen years does everything she can to keep the worries of the world away. Vincent, Tallie’s accountant for the last fifteen years, keeps track of her fortune. Hunter, Tallie’s live in boyfriend of four years and producer of her most recent films, keeps the home fires burning while she is on location. Tallie’s aging father and law school student daughter round out the major players in her life.

               When Tallie discovers that more than one of them has been lying to her, her world comes tumbling down.

               I the ensuing chaos, Tallie meets FBI agent Jim Kingston who helps right the legal wrongs that have been done to her, and gives her life a new stability.  This allows Tallie to build her world to new and even greater heights.

               I liked this book. It was a quick, fun read, if a little predictable.

V Is For Vengeance by Sue Grafton

Kinsey Millhone #22

          I’ve missed the last four or five books in this series, but

did not feel lost at all in this one. While Kinsey Millhone’s

friends and neighbors make their regular appearances here,

the story line works quite well as a standalone.

          The story starts with Kinsey witnessing a shoplifter and reporting her to store security. Soon after the woman is arrested, she dies. This woman’s fiancée shows up on Kinsey’s doorstep asking her to look into the death. The story spirals out into organized retail theft and further into family run organized crime and police corruption. Nearly everyone gets what’s coming to them by the end. And Kinsey is left with the means to get vengeance on her worst enemy.

          If you’ve never read one of Grafton’s alphabet mysteries, I’d surely suggest picking up a few of the early ones just to get a feel for the recurring characters.  If you’ve read them all, you’re going to love this one too! 

          Respectfully submitted,

Angle of Investigation by Michael Connelly

               This is a collection of three short Harry Bosch stories.

               Christmas Even is the story of a thief who has robbed the same pawn shop four times. He was shocked to discover, during his fourth and final break in, that the pawn shop owner had finally had enough.

               Father’s Day is the very sad tale of an all too common, but dreadful, death of a child. As we’ve all read in the papers, a parent became distracted and forgot his sleeping child was in the car seat in the back. This one is a tragedy on a number of levels besides the obvious.

               Angle of Investigation has Harry reopening a cold case. As it happens, he and his trainer found this body on Harry’s second day ever on patrol. With the help of new technology and something only his old trainer knew, Harry puts a decades old drowning to bed.

               If you are a Harry Bosch fan, I’d definitely get a copy of this ebook. Each of these stories gives a bit of insight into Harry as well as determining who done it.

Longing by Karen Kingsbury

               Bailey Flanigan #3

               God may be a football fan, but I am not.  Nor am I fond of being preached at.  It’s been quite some time since I failed to finish a book on my list, but I couldn’t stand another syllable.  I broke my own rule about giving a book three chapters to catch me before I give it up.  About half way through the second chapter, a high school football coach allows an injured player to go back onto the field.  Don’t even get me started on the total irresponsibility of such a move.  I knew at that point, that in my eyes, this book was irredeemable.  I shut down the audio player. Life is too short to waste it on this story.

               Of course, if you like football or are heavy into Christian literature, this book may be for you.

The Snow Angel by Glenn Beck

               This was a quick read for which I am grateful. Two stories run in parallel until they finally meet at the very end. 

                Rachel, the child of an alcoholic mother and an absentee father find herself in an abusive marriage. The day her husband turns his temper on their daughter, she finally finds the strength to leave. With the love and help of two friends who have stuck with her through her marriage, she and her daughter escape her abuser and head out to start a new life. But, she needs to make one last stop before they go.

               Mitch’s story plays out in a single day – Christmas Eve. He wakes to discover he is an old man, in an unfamiliar place, surrounded by strangers. Alzheimer’s has wreaked its havoc on his memory, but he understands it is Christmas Eve, and he knows he is waiting for someone. He’s just not sure who.

               The final scenes play out as Rachel encounters her father for the first time in over a decade. While he does not recognize Rachel as an adult, he mistakes his granddaughter for her mother. This is the child he has been waiting for. The one he knows he let down in a thousand ways, and the one he has waited many years from whom to ask forgiveness.

               It is all very sad and sweet.  Not my usual cup of tea, but a fairly well written little story. If you like heavily emotional, bittersweet ending stories, this one’s for you.

Defending Jacob by William Landay

               I was torn while reading this story. On one hand, I was absolutely riveted and couldn’t wait to find out what happened next. On the other hand, just knew what I was seeing was utterly disturbing and I just wanted to look away. Depending on where I was in the story, I couldn’t wait to get back to it, or I totally dreaded reading the next section.

               As a parent, the very thought of my child being arrested for murder makes me a little bit ill. How much worse it would be if the possibility existed my child could be guilty. This is the situation faced by the Barbers in this story.

               As a parent, how would I react if I realized that I had brought a monster into the world? How far would I go to protect my child? How much could I disregard the safety of those around us? This is the dilemma faced by the Barbers in this story.  I totally understand the very different reactions of both parents, and wonder which I would be more inclined to emulate.

               I’m giving this book a good rating even though it is not entertaining in the usual sense. It was a very uncomfortable book for me to read. But like watching a train hurtle toward a trestle rigged to blow, I could not look away.

The Christmas Wedding by James Patterson and Richard DiLallo

          I listened to the audio book version of this one, and thoroughly enjoyed it.   The premise would have seemed a bit farfetched, except that I know someone it happened to.  Gaby gets a marriage proposal, not so unreal. It happens all the time.  But, two other men decide they cannot let her get away without a fight.  They both propose as well.  Now she is juggling three proposals.

          She also has grown children that she hasn’t seen as a group since their father died several years earlier. She decides to use the wedding as a way to get the family together for Christmas.  She plans the wedding for Christmas Day, but throws in a twist.  She will not reveal the identity of the groom until the ceremony is about to begin!

          There is a lot of fun and excitement, and several small twists to keep the action moving. Gaby keeps her kids in the loop via video messages that she records, copies and sends to them all. At the moment of truth, Gaby announces the name of the groom and they are duly wed. The part that amazes me is that the author leads us to believe that Gaby’s relationship with the pair of suitors she refused will not change.

          That point aside, I recommend this book to those who enjoy love stories and family dramas. It’s a quick, fun read and thoroughly enjoyable.

1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

               This is a looooong book – it took me ten or eleven days to read it. Even so, I’m not sure I’d have cut out more than a few sentences, if I’d had the opportunity. The story is complex and tightly woven with few extraneous loose threads hanging out. I was very impressed.

               I started with a certain level of concern that I would have trouble reading such a long work based in another culture. Sometimes translations of foreign works leave me struggling with cultural ignorance issues – my cultural ignorance, not the author’s.  I often find names of people and places hard to deal with as well. Not so much with 1Q84. Fortunately, translating Japanese into English is very much a spell-like-it-sounds proposition.

               I recommend this story. It is absolutely not a quick, fun read. But it kept me interested and entertained for over a week!

Flash and Bones by Kathy Reichs

               Temperance Brennan #14

               Flash and Bones is the fourteenth in the Temperance Brennan series. I have not read them all, but have taken in and enjoyed several of them. This one is set to the backdrop of the Charlotte Motor Speedway during race week of the Coca-Cola 600.  Since we are a NASCAR family, I am quite familiar with Charlotte, North Carolina, the history of NASCAR, and many of its most famous names, past and present.  Reichs captured the less than sane fanaticism of NASCAR aficionados very well, and gave some excellent background on the sport for those readers less familiar than I.

               I was, however, a little disappointed with the rest of the story. It almost seemed as though Reichs used the excitement and drama of race week as a crutch for a weak story line.

               Overall, it’s a pretty good book, but if I had failed to appreciate the NASCAR angle, it would not have fared so well with me.

Lethal by Sandra Brown

               I liked this one. It sucked me in early and kept me interested. And I was sure I had it all figured out until the very end when I was forced to admit I am not always as smart as I think I am.

               I especially liked the kid in this one – Emily.  She’s four. Brown must have kids of her own because she nailed this one. The child is bright and inquisitive and utterly forthright as only a four-year-old can be.

               I listened to this book, which is the only reason I didn’t finish it all in one day. It’s a good who-done-it with plenty of twists, turns, fun and fear along the way.

77 Shadow Street by Dean Koontz

               I’m not a regular reader of Dean Koontz or any other horror writer for that matter.  Regular readers of this site will know by now that I read to be entertained and being scared and/or grossed out is not my idea of entertainment. However, this book made the best seller list and I put it on my to-read schedule. 

               I was fairly impressed 77 Shadow Street. It is as much a science fiction story as a horror story. One of my favorite sci-fi concepts is time travel, and while time travel is not really the point of this book, time shifts within the setting are ongoing throughout the story which piqued my interest. Another ongoing concept in the book is the idea of nanotechnology being able to transform human beings, in this case pretty horribly. A third sci-fi thread running through the story is the “rise of the machines”, artificially intelligent creations eventually taking over the earth and destroying the humans that created them in the first place. This concept is not one of my favorites, but it is a very intriguing and frightening idea.

               And, of course, in the time and place of this story, the humans do prevail. Those who will unwittingly unleash the machines in the future are rendered harmless in the present. But as with any good horror story, the villain remains, biding his time and doing his best to bring about the correct series of events in the past that will allow it to prevail in the future.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safron Foer

               I nearly gave up on this one several times, it’s been turned into a movie, and I figured it had to develop a better story line soon. I disliked this book so much the movie will probably be nominated for an Oscar.  [9 out of 10 Oscar nominated films are ones I feel I paid too much for…]

               My biggest problem with this book is that I did not find it entertaining – heartbreaking, horrifying, inscrutable, yes, but no fun.

               I can remember being utterly horrified as a child by a description of the bombing of Dresden, Germany. The description here made me feel a bit ill. And though it has been more than a decade, mentally reliving 9/11 is still upsetting.

               On a lighter note, though, it s been a very long time since I read a work of fiction with this many illustrations.

               I don’t recommend reading this book.  Maybe the movie is less depressing.

The Sweetest Thing by Barbara Freethy

               When an old man stops into Faith’s Fancies, a pastry shop,  and weaves a tale of love and loss and ancient curses, the very practical Faith doesn’t really believe him. But she is charmed by Julien and agrees to assist him in tracking down the love of his life that he hasn’t seen in fifty years.

               Faith soon meets Julien’s grandson, Alex, a successful business owner and a man afraid to open his heart to anyone.

               As the search for Julien’s lost love moves forward, Faith and Alex find themselves drawn to each other, but both have a lot of baggage to unload – and a curse to lift – before they can fall in love and create the family they both want so much.

               This was a quick, fun read. It took me a while to connect that the title is The Sweetest Thing because Faith is a pastry chef. I enjoyed this book, but maybe I would have liked it better if I were more awake when I read it. Go ahead and give it a taste, it’s quite entertaining!

The Best of Me by Nicholas Sparks

            Wow! That’s my initial reaction upon finishing this book. Wow! If I had to pick three words that best describe this book, they would be wow, wow and wow! This one really blew me away.

               I had to wonder at my intense reaction, though. If I hadn’t read it at this point in my life, would it have touched me so deeply? I don’t know the answer for sure, but I suspect it is “no”. I do know that in this book, Sparks describes the sweetest love story I ever remember hearing.  He also describes a person in such a way that it rocked me to my core. I know that person.  I’ve met her.  I agree with everything he said about her. If I’d never lived through my own love stories and never met the people Sparks’ descriptions evoked in me, I’m sure I would have reacted differently to the story.

               The Best of Me also resonated with because I believe that doing the right thing ultimately benefits me even if I don’t see the immediate cause and effect. I believe everything we do affects those around us. I think we all have a purpose in our lives, even if we cannot determine it ourselves. And, I really do believe the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, even when I find myself to be a member of the few. All of this theme appear in this book.

               I think this is a great book for adults.  I don’t know that a young person would necessarily have the experiences to relate well to this tale. And I also think it will be a book that will speak to me differently every time I read it.

               Wow!