29. Her First Mistake by Kendra Elliott

#1 Noelle Marshall, Bend, OR police detective

listened on Audible 

343pgs.

2025
Adult Murder Mystery
Finished 6/30/25 (Happy Birthday, Mom!)
Goodreads rating: 3.42
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary Bend, OR

My comments: 4.5  An excellent first-in-a-series about a police detective in Bend, Oregon, which mainly centers around her own personal mystery, the murder of her politician-husband.  Told back and forth during three time periods, it's an attention-grabbing story to be sure!  Just what I needed

Goodreads synopsis:  When a very personal cold case murder is reopened, a detective’s secrets come to light in a novel of shocking twists and suspense by a Wall Street Journal bestselling author.

Thirteen years ago, Assemblyman Derrick Bell was murdered in his home by an intruder. His wife, Noelle Marshall, was left for dead. The crime was unsolved, but it wasn’t forgotten.

Today the FBI is tackling a fresh perspective on the case and looking to Noelle, now a detective for the Deschutes County sheriff’s office, for new clues. It is reopening everything Noelle thought was behind her. Memories of her escape from a traumatic childhood. A marriage that wasn’t the perfect love story she’d been promised. And a husband whose charm and privilege hid a dark side. But Noelle has been hiding something a secret about the night Derrick died that she has never told anyone.

As past and present and leads and misleads collide, one thing is frighteningly clear. Derrick’s murder wasn’t just unsolved. It’s unfinished. And only the truth—no matter the risk—can save the next victim.

12. The Nature of Disappearing by Kimi Cunningham Grant

listened on Libby

304 pgs. (9:41)

2024
adult mystery/thriller
Finished 3/5/2025
Goodreads rating: 3.66
My rating: 3
Setting: contemporary Idaho woods

My comments: Relationships, trust, addiction, survival skills and poor self-esteem seem to be the main themes of this book.  I enjoyed the adventure of being miles and miles into land where there's no one else, including no wi-fi.  But I wasn't fond of the way the story kept flipping back-and-forth to tell the whole story.  I usually don't mind this sort of thing, but this one didn't work for me....this could've been told at once in a much shorter, less boring presentation.  Perhaps it switched back-and-forth too frequently?  I just wasn't fond of the way the book was put together and had to force myself to go back to finish it.

Goodreads synopsis:  In this captivating novel of suspense, a wilderness guide must team up with the man who ruined her life years ago when the friend who introduced them goes missing.

     Emlyn doesn’t let herself think about the past.
     How she and her best friend, Janessa, barely speak anymore. How Tyler, the man she thought was the love of her life, left her freezing and half-dead on the side of the road three years ago.
     Her new life is simple and safe. She works as a fishing and hunting guide, spending her days in Idaho’s endless woods and scenic rivers. She lives alone in her Airstream trailer, her closest friends a handsome and kind Forest Service ranger and the community’s makeshift reverend, who took her in at her lowest.
     But when Tyler shows up with the news that Janessa is missing, Emlyn is propelled back into the world she worked so hard to forget. Janessa, it turns out, has become a social media star, documenting her #vanlife adventures with her rugged survivalist boyfriend. But she hasn’t posted lately, and when she does, it’s from a completely different location than where her caption claims to be. In spite of their fractured history, Emlyn knows she might be the only one with the knowledge and tracking skills to save her friend, so she reluctantly teams up with Tyler. As the two trace Janessa’s path through miles of wild country, Emlyn can’t deny there’s still chemistry crackling between them. But the deeper they press into the wilderness, the more she begins to suspect that a darker truth lies in the woods―and that Janessa isn’t the only one in danger.
      Poignant, suspenseful, and unforgettable, THE NATURE OF DISAPPEARING explores what it takes to start over―and the cost of letting the past pull you back in.

10. The Vanishing Season by Joanna Schaffhausen

#1 Ellery Hathaway

listened on Libby

274 pgs. (8:58)

2017
Adult mystery/thriller
Finished 3/1/2025
Goodreads rating: 3.81
My rating: 4
Setting: contemporary small town central Massachusetts

My comments: Ellery had been the victim of a serial killer, saved in the nick of time by a young FBI agent named Agent Reed Markham. Years later she's a top in a small Massachusetts town where no one knows her identity.  However, for the past three years she's been receiving ominous anonymous birthday cards, and there has been three annual disappearances, all at the beginning of the month of July.  She knows something is awry.  So she gets in touch with that FBI agent from fourteen years ago and more problems ensue.  This is good storytelling and kept me quite attentive.  Sick minds.  Very sick minds. A very bad guy and his equally-as-bad copycat. 

    Note:  Abrupt ending

    Another note:  I never really liked or trusted the protagonist, I'm not sure why.....

Goodreads:  Ellery Hathaway knows a thing or two about serial killers, but not through her police training. She's an officer in sleepy Woodbury, MA, where a bicycle theft still makes the newspapers. No one there knows she was once victim number seventeen in the grisly story of serial killer Francis Michael Coben. The only one who lived.

When three people disappear from her town in three years―all around her birthday―Ellery fears someone knows her secret. Someone very dangerous. Her superiors dismiss her concerns, but Ellery knows the vanishing season is coming and anyone could be next. She contacts the one man she knows will believe her: the FBI agent who saved her from a killer all those years ago.

Agent Reed Markham made his name and fame on the back of the Coben case, but his fortunes have since turned. His marriage is in shambles, his bosses think he's washed up, and worst of all, he blew a major investigation. When Ellery calls him, he can’t help but wonder: sure, he rescued her, but was she ever truly saved? His greatest triumph is Ellery’s waking nightmare, and now both of them are about to be sucked into the past, back to the case that made them...with a killer who can't let go.

63. A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham

listened on Libby

357 pgs.

2022
Genre/Level
Finished 7/14/24
Goodreads rating: 3.99
My rating:  3
Setting: Contemporary Louisiana

My comments: For me, I think, it's hard to enjoy a story when you don't like or understand the protagonist.  To do really brave things without consequences for the final outcome, then refuse to do simple things that would be quite easy ... well, I don't get it.  Not too many surprises although it seemed to take forever for the final eents that pull the entire story together.  It was aggravating for me to hear Chloe go on and on and on and around and around in circles.  What a twit.  

Goodreads synopsis:  

Goodreads Choice Award

Nominee for Best Mystery & Thriller (2022), Nominee for Best Debut Novel (2022)

When Chloe Davis was twelve, six teenage girls went missing in her small Louisiana town. By the end of the summer, Chloe’s father had been arrested as a serial killer and promptly put in prison. Chloe and the rest of her family were left to grapple with the truth and try to move forward while dealing with the aftermath.

Now 20 years later, Chloe is a psychologist in private practice in Baton Rouge and getting ready for her wedding. She finally has a fragile grasp on the happiness she’s worked so hard to get. Sometimes, though, she feels as out of control of her own life as the troubled teens who are her patients. And then a local teenage girl goes missing, and then another, and that terrifying summer comes crashing back. Is she paranoid, and seeing parallels that aren't really there, or for the second time in her life, is she about to unmask a killer?

In a debut novel that has already been optioned for a limited series by actress Emma Stone and sold to a dozen countries around the world, Stacy Willingham has created an unforgettable character in a spellbinding thriller that will appeal equally to fans of Gillian Flynn and Karin Slaughter.

38. First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston

listened on Libby
340 pgs.

2024
Adult Mystery/Thriller
Finished 4/29/2024
Goodreads rating: 4.07
My rating: 5
Setting: Louisiana

My comments: Set in Louisiana and split between current day and bits and pieces of "jobs" over the previous eight years, we follow Evie Porter and her current "mark" Ryan Sumner.  Evie is a con-woman, a really clever one, who works for the mysterious and unknown Mr. Smith.  This intricate story, beautifully woven with fun surprises thrown in here and there, was very hard to put down.

Goodreads synopsis:  Evie Porter has everything a nice, Southern girl could want: a perfect, doting boyfriend, a house with a white picket fence and a garden, a fancy group of friends. The only catch: Evie Porter doesn’t exist.

The identity comes first: Evie Porter. Once she’s given a name and location by her mysterious boss Mr. Smith, she learns everything there is to know about the town and the people in it. Then the mark: Ryan Sumner. The last piece of the puzzle is the job.

Evie isn’t privy to Mr. Smith’s real identity, but she knows this job will be different. Ryan has gotten under her skin, and she’s starting to envision a different sort of life for herself. But Evie can’t make any mistakes—especially after what happened last time.

Because the one thing she’s worked her entire life to keep clean, the one identity she could always go back to—her real identity—just walked right into this town. Evie Porter must stay one step ahead of her past while making sure there’s still a future in front of her. The stakes couldn't be higher—but then, Evie has always liked a challenge...

3. We Lie Here by Rachel Howzell Hall

listened on Audible

2022

416 pgs.
Adult Mystery/Thriller
Finished 1/8/2023
Goodreads rating:  3.84
My rating: 3.5
Setting: Contemporary Palmdale, CA

My comments:

Figured this out pretty early on, no surprises at all at the end.  

Pros:  I liked the setting of the dusty California high desert.  After the beginning, told quite well.

Cons:  Difficult to get into, and I figured most of it out pretty early.  Characters were similar and not really fleshed out too well.  Shifts in who the storyteller was (there were two, the protagonist and a then "bad guy" once in awhile.)

Goodreads synopsis:  A woman’s trip home reveals frightening truths in a twisty novel of murder and family secrets by the New York Times bestselling author of And Now She’s Gone and These Toxic Things.

TV writer Yara Gibson’s hometown of Palmdale, California, isn’t her first choice for a vacation. But she’s back to host her parents’ twentieth-anniversary party and find the perfect family mementos for the celebration. Everything is going to plan until Yara receives a disturbing text: I have information that will change your life.

The message is from Felicia Campbell, who claims to be a childhood friend of Yara’s mother. But they’ve been estranged for years—drama best ignored and forgotten. But Yara can’t forget Felicia, who keeps texting, insisting that Yara talk to her “before it’s too late.”

But the next day is already too late for Felicia, whose body is found floating in Lake Palmdale. Before she died, Felicia left Yara a key to a remote lakeside cabin. In the basement are files related to a mysterious tragedy, unsolved since 1998. What secrets was Felicia hiding? How much of what Yara knows about her family has been true?

The deeper Yara digs for answers, the more she fears that Felicia was right. Uncovering the truth about what happened at the cabin all those years ago will change Yara’s life—or end it.

35. The Book of Cold Cases by Simone St. James

listened on Libby - borrowed from the library

2022
344 pgs.
Mystery/Thriller - with ghosts
Finished 4/26/22
Goodreads rating: 3.94
My rating: 3
Setting: 1970's and contemporary Oregon

My comments: Two great female narrators, loved listening to them.  A ghost story, with everything based in reality except for one particular protagonist who is a dad, hateful ghost.  It didn't work for me, not at all.  Although I may remember this book in the future, it won't go down as a favorite.

Goodreads synopsis:  In 1977, Claire Lake, Oregon, was shaken by the Lady Killer Murders: Two men, seemingly randomly, were murdered with the same gun, with strange notes left behind. Beth Greer was the perfect suspect--a rich, eccentric twenty-three-year-old woman, seen fleeing one of the crimes. But she was acquitted, and she retreated to the isolation of her mansion.

Oregon, 2017. Shea Collins is a receptionist, but by night, she runs a true crime website, the Book of Cold Cases--a passion fueled by the attempted abduction she escaped as a child. When she meets Beth by chance, Shea asks her for an interview. To Shea's surprise, Beth says yes.

They meet regularly at Beth's mansion, though Shea is never comfortable there. Items move when she's not looking, and she could swear she's seen a girl outside the window. The allure of learning the truth about the case from the smart, charming Beth is too much to resist, but even as they grow closer, Shea senses something isn't right. Is she making friends with a manipulative murderer, or are there other dangers lurking in the darkness of the Greer house?

A true crime blogger gets more than she bargained for while interviewing the woman acquitted of two cold case slayings in this chilling new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Sun Down Motel.

37. Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell

listened on Libby/borrowed from the Library

narrated by Helen Duff - wonderful (three different accents, male, female, child seamlessly)

Unabridged audio (10:12)
2017
359 pgs.
Adult Mystery/Thriller
Finished 4/11/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.04 - 266,495 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: contemporary America

First line/s: "Those months, the months before she disappeared, were the best months.  Really.  Just the best."

My comments: Even though you knew pretty much exactly what had happened from very near the beginning of the book, I did enjoy listening to the story unfold in its various voices.  Yes, very sad story for everyone involved, but watching Laurel move through this decade of heartbreak from her point of view was particularly well done, I think.  The only character I didn't feel was as completely created as the rest was that of Floyd, and his part in the story didn't quite make sense to me.  I couldn't put this down.  Wonderful reader who could switch accents from British to Irish to American seamlessly, as well as adjusting voice to male, female, child.

Goodreads synopsis:  THEN
          She was fifteen, her mother's golden girl. She had her whole life ahead of her. And then, in the blink of an eye, Ellie was gone.
                    NOW         

          It’s been ten years since Ellie disappeared, but Laurel has never given up hope of finding her daughter.
          And then one day a charming and charismatic stranger called Floyd walks into a café and sweeps Laurel off her feet.
          Before too long she’s staying the night at this house and being introduced to his nine year old daughter.
          Poppy is precocious and pretty - and meeting her completely takes Laurel's breath away.
          Because Poppy is the spitting image of Ellie when she was that age. And now all those unanswered questions that have haunted Laurel come flooding back.
          What happened to Ellie? Where did she go?
          Who still has secrets to hide?

19. Shiver by Allie Reynolds

listened on Audible

narrated by Olivia Vinall (enjoyable)
Unabridged audio (10:22)
2021
432 pgs.
Contemporary "Locked Room" Mystery
Finished 3/6/21
Goodreads rating: 3.89 -4498 ratings
My rating: 3.5
Setting: Contemporary off-season ski resort in the French Alps

First line/s: "It's that time of year again.  The time the glacier gives up bodies."

My comments: This was definitely a different, interesting plot  Five friends/acquaintances have been summonsed anonymously to the same snowboard training center on a glacier in the Alps where they had met ten years previously when they wer training for the British snowboard championships.  It's all a big mystery about who has summonsed them....someone is trying to solve the mystery of what happened to Curtis's sister, Saskia, who disappeared during that time.  Mila tells the story in the first person and flips back-and-forth from the present to the time before, melding the two stories into one so that we discover, slowly, what had happened that winter.  The tension rises when their phones are stolen, the electricity keeps going out, there's a storm coming, and there's no way to get back down to the bottom of the moutain.  Definite tension.  Lots of talk about snowboarding, glaciers, tricks and moves that didn't really interest me, but on the whole it was pretty decent storytelling.  Enjoyed the narrations.

Goodreads synopsis:  In this propulsive locked-room thriller debut, a reunion weekend in the French Alps turns deadly when five friends discover that someone has deliberately stranded them at their remote mountaintop resort during a snowstorm.
          When Milla accepts an off-season invitation to Le Rocher, a cozy ski resort in the French Alps, she's expecting an intimate weekend of catching up with four old friends. It might have been a decade since she saw them last, but she's never forgotten the bond they forged on this very mountain during a winter spent fiercely training for an elite snowboarding competition.
          Yet no sooner do Milla and the others arrive for the reunion than they realize something is horribly wrong. The resort is deserted. The cable cars that delivered them to the mountaintop have stopped working. Their cell phones--missing. And inside the hotel, detailed instructions await them: an icebreaker game, designed to draw out their secrets. A game meant to remind them of Saskia, the enigmatic sixth member of their group, who vanished the morning of the competition years before and has long been presumed dead.
          Stranded in the resort, Milla's not sure what's worse: the increasingly sinister things happening around her or the looming snowstorm that's making escape even more impossible. All she knows is that there's no one on the mountain she can trust. Because someone has gathered them there to find out the truth about Saskia...someone who will stop at nothing to get answers. And if Milla's not careful, she could be the next to disappear... 

1. Don't Look for Me by Wendy Walker

listened on Libby, borrowed from the library

narrated by Therese Plummer, beautifully

Unabridged audio (9:51)
2020
342 pgs.
Adult Mystery/Thriller
Finished 1/3/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.03 - 2767 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: contemporary rural Connecticut

First line/s: "The sky grows dark as I drive."

My comments: First book of 2021!  Told back-and-forth in two voices - one a kidnapped mother, the other her daughter trying to find her.  Both still hurting horribly from the accidental death of the youngest daughter/sister.  It has scarred them both deeply.  Set in contemporary Connecticut and narrated beautifully, the story was mesmerizing.  HEA.

Goodreads synopsis:  One night, Molly Clarke walked away from her life. The car abandoned miles from home. The note found at a nearby hotel. The shattered family that couldn't be put back together. It happens all the time. Women disappear, desperate to leave their lives behind and start over. She doesn't want to be found. Or at least, that's the story. But is that what really happened to Molly Clarke?
          The night Molly disappeared began with a storm, running out of gas, and a man in a truck offering her a ride to town. With him is a little girl who reminds her of the daughter she lost years ago. It feels like a sign. And Molly is overcome with the desire to be home, with her family—no matter how broken it is. She accepts the ride. But when the doors are locked shut, Molly begins to suspect she has made a terrible mistake.
          When a new lead comes in after the search has ended, Molly's daughter, Nicole, begins to wonder. Nothing about her mother's disappearance makes sense.
          Nicole returns to the small, desolate town where her mother was last seen to find the truth. The locals are kind and eager to help. The innkeeper. The bartender. Even the police. Until secrets begin to reveal themselves and she comes closer to the truth about that night—and the danger surrounding her.

96. Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty

listened to audio - borrowed from Bosler
narrated by Caroline Lee
Unabridged audio (16:18)
2018 Flatiron Books
453 pgs.
Adult Mystery/Thriller
Finished 6/15/20
Goodreads rating:  3.50 - 325,076  ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: contemporary - outside Sydney, Australia

What I posted on GoodReads:  4.5  Excellent character development, a little long, great ending.

First line/s: " 'I'm fine,' said the woman.  'There's nothing wrong with me.'"

My comments: A wonderful, slow-burn character study of eleven individuals that are thrown together during one crazy, impactful week.  You get a little bit of a lot of things - drug abuse and dependency, teenage suicide, battling self-esteem issues, and even becoming a multi millionaire overnight, with all the issues that might accompany that.  I very much enjoyed the character development and growing relationships.  It got a little slow at about the 3/4 mark, but the best part for me was the way Moriarty decided to end the book.  The last 5% just tickled me!

Goodreads synopsis:  Could ten days at a health resort really change you forever?
          These nine perfect strangers are about to find out...
          Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Some are here to lose weight, some are here to get a reboot on life, some are here for reasons they can’t even admit to themselves. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know these ten days might involve some real work. But none of them could imagine just how challenging the next ten days are going to be.
          Frances Welty, the formerly best-selling romantic novelist, arrives at Tranquillum House nursing a bad back, a broken heart, and an exquisitely painful paper cut. She’s immediately intrigued by her fellow guests. Most of them don’t look to be in need of a health resort at all. But the person that intrigues her most is the strange and charismatic owner/director of Tranquillum House. Could this person really have the answers Frances didn’t even know she was seeking? Should Frances put aside her doubts and immerse herself in everything Tranquillum House has to offer—or should she run while she still can?
          It’s not long before every guest at Tranquillum House is asking exactly the same question.
          Combining all of the hallmarks that have made Liane Moriarty's writing a go-to for anyone looking for wickedly smart, page-turning fiction that will make you laugh and gasp, Nine Perfect Strangers once again shows why she is a master of her craft.

10. Jar of Hearts by Jennifer Hillier

Listened to audio, borrowed from library
Narrated  by January LaVoy (super easy to listen to, good with voices)
Unabridged audio (10:23)
2018 Minotaur Books
311 pgs.
Adult Mystery Thriller
Finished 1/16/2020
Goodreads rating: 4.06 - 11,241 ratings
My rating: 4.5
Setting: Contemporary Seattle, Washington, with flashbacks 15 and 20 years.

First line/s:  "The trial has barely made a dent in the national news."

My comments:  A hugely mesmerizing story, told in snippets back-and-forth fifteen years apart, the story solwly peels back the layers of what happened one fateful night.  This examines all sorts of love - loe of friends, love of lovers, and love of parents and their children.  Once I started reading/listening I couldn't stop.  Giving clues along the way - some of the pretty blatant, actually - I totally enjoyed this piece of storytelling, no matter how upsetting it became.  I don't think I should have enjoyed it as much as I did!

Goodreads synopsis:  This is the story of three best friends: one who was murdered, one who went to prison, and one who's been searching for the truth all these years . . .
          When she was sixteen years old, Angela Wong—one of the most popular girls in school—disappeared without a trace. Nobody ever suspected that her best friend, Georgina Shaw, now an executive and rising star at her Seattle pharmaceutical company, was involved in any way. Certainly not Kaiser Brody, who was close with both girls back in high school.
          But fourteen years later, Angela Wong's remains are discovered in the woods near Geo's childhood home. And Kaiser—now a detective with Seattle PD—finally learns the truth: Angela was a victim of Calvin James. The same Calvin James who murdered at least three other women.
          To the authorities, Calvin is a serial killer. But to Geo, he's something else entirely. Back in high school, Calvin was Geo's first love. Turbulent and often volatile, their relationship bordered on obsession from the moment they met right up until the night Angela was killed.
          For fourteen years, Geo knew what happened to Angela and told no one. For fourteen years, she carried the secret of Angela's death until Geo was arrested and sent to prison.
          While everyone thinks they finally know the truth, there are dark secrets buried deep. And what happened that fateful night is more complex and more chilling than anyone really knows. Now the obsessive past catches up with the deadly present when new bodies begin to turn up, killed in the exact same manner as Angela Wong.
          How far will someone go to bury her secrets and hide her grief? How long can you get away with a lie? How long can you live with it?

89. Sanctus by Simon Toyne

read on my iPhone/Kindle/Book/Audible
2011 Harper
486 pgs.
Adult Mystery
Finished 9/5/18
Goodreads rating: 3.81 - 7049 ratings
My rating:  2
Setting: Contemporary Turkey

First line/s:  "A flash of light filled his skull as it struck the rock floor."

My comments: I quite enjoyed this until the "revelation"" at the end, which made me roll my eyes...heavenward, lol...  I actually quite liked the writing, especially the descriptions, but the premise of the story was silly  So, liked and and disliked it....

Goodreads synopsis:  REVELATION OR DEVASTATION?
          The certainties of the modern world are about to be blown apart by a three thousand year-old conspiracy nurtured by blood and lies …
          A man throws himself to his death from the oldest inhabited place on the face of the earth, a mountainous citadel in the historic Turkish city of Ruin. This is no ordinary suicide but a symbolic act. And thanks to the media, it is witnessed by the entire world.
          But few understand it. For charity worker Kathryn Mann and a handful of others in the know, it is what they have been waiting for. The cowled and secretive fanatics that live in the Citadel suspect it could mean the end of everything they have built – and they will kill, torture and break every law to stop that. For Liv Adamsen, New York crime reporter, it begins the next stage of a journey into the heart of her own identity.
          And at that journey's end lies a discovery that will change EVERYTHING …
SANCTUS is an apocalyptic conspiracy thriller like no other – it re-sets the bar for excitement and fascination, and marks the debut of a major talent in Simon Toyne.

39. Down to the Wire - David Rosenfelt

listened in the car
2010
294 pgs.
Adult mystery
Finished 6-5-15
Goodreads rating: 3.74
My rating: 3.5
Setting:  contemporary New Jersey

First line/s: "If you're a corpse, you should get your name in the paper."

My comments:  A pretty decent story, the surprises weren't totally surprising but the whole plot kept you guessing...right, wrong, right wrong.....and I actually think the protagonist, Chris Turley was a little naive.  But it worked great for passing the time back and forth to school when I couldn't wait for school to get out.  Yes, I'd read another by this author.

Goodreads synopsis: A reporter for the Bergen News, Chris Turley could never measure up to his father. Edward Turley, a combination of Bob Woodward and Ernie Pyle, was one of the last great investigative reporters and a difficult man to impress. While stuck covering press conferences and town hall meetings, Chris, his father’s legend in mind, has always dreamed of his own Pulitzer, however unlikely it seems.
          Then one day while he’s waiting to meet a source, a giant explosion takes out half of an office building next door. Shocked into action, Chris saves five people from the burning building. His firsthand account in the next day’s paper makes him a hero and a celebrity.
          And that’s not all. The source’s next tip delivers a second headline-grabber of a story for Chris, and suddenly his career is looking a lot more like his dad’s. But then it seems this anonymous source has had a plan for Chris all along, and his luck for being in the right place at the right time is not a coincidence at all. What seemed like a reporter’s dream quickly becomes an inescapable nightmare.
          Down to the Wire, David Rosenfelt’s shocking new thriller about an ordinary man who gets exactly what he’s always wanted at a price he can never pay, is an intense thrill ride that will have readers racing through the pages right up to the end.

50. Night Film - Marisha Pessl

Audio read by Jake Weber

19 (! !) discs, 23 hours

2013, Random House Audio

602 pgs.

Adult Mystery/Thriller

Finished 11/10/13

Goodreads Rating: 3.89

My Rating:  Awesome (5) (It totally "took me away" for all 23 hours)

TPPL

Setting: NYC with a few forays a little north into NY state

My comments:  Wow.  This book was mesmerizing.  I listened to it, but also took a couple trips during the listening to the bookstore to peruse some of the actual pages.  There are many emails, photos, newspaper articles (etc.) that look like the real thing.  Once you realize, as you're listening, that the flow of the story has changed a bit, you can still listen without missing a single thing.  The story was complicated and interesting, keeping you guessing and wondering; the characters were interesting and pretty well fleshed out.   I loved learning all the new clues along with the protagonist, as if I were part of his inexperienced investigative team.  I loved wondering whether the occult was really involved, as did the protagonist.  It got a little slow at the end, when I thought the book should be done and Pessl didn't seem to want to end it.  I should have realized she had a reason.  Well worth 19 discs and 23 hours!  Added note:  I REALLY don't like the cover.

Goodreads Review:  A page-turning thriller for readers of Stephen King, Gillian Flynn, and Stieg Larsson, Night Film tells the haunting story of a journalist who becomes obsessed with the mysterious death of a troubled prodigy—the daughter of an iconic, reclusive filmmaker.

On a damp October night, beautiful young Ashley Cordova is found dead in an abandoned warehouse in lower Manhattan. Though her death is ruled a suicide, veteran investigative journalist Scott McGrath suspects otherwise. As he probes the strange circumstances surrounding Ashley’s life and death, McGrath comes face-to-face with the legacy of her father: the legendary, reclusive cult-horror-film director Stanislas Cordova—a man who hasn’t been seen in public for more than thirty years.  For McGrath, another death connected to this seemingly cursed family dynasty seems more than just a coincidence. Though much has been written about Cordova’s dark and unsettling films, very little is known about the man himself.  Driven by revenge, curiosity, and a need for the truth, McGrath, with the aid of two strangers, is drawndeeper and deeper into Cordova’s eerie, hypnotic world.  The last time he got close to exposing the director, McGrath lost his marriage and his career. This time he might lose even more.

MOVIE - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

MOVIE - Safe House

Released 2-10-12
R (1:55)
RT Critics 54 Audience 69
My rating:  2.5 (It was decent)
Director:  Daniel Espinosa
Universal Pictures

Ryan Reynolds, Denzel Washington

Matt Weston (Reynolds) sits day after day in a Safe House in Cape Town, South Africa, in an in-between CIA position, waiting for something to happen before he is fully employed in the manner that he wants.  Tobin Frost (Washington) is an ex-intelligence officer who's been "wanted" for over ten years.  There are mercenaries after Frost, as well as the government, as the two have to become reluctant partners...with Frost always seeming to be devilishly untrustable.

MOVIE - The Double Hour

Good movie.  Good mystery.  Great storytelling.
in Italian, with subtitles
limited release 4-15-11
Unrated (1:35)
July 30 at the Loft, alone
RT  82% cag 91%
Director:  Giuseppe Capatondi

Guido, a handsome guy in Turin, Italy, has been part of the speed dating scene for awhile, hooking up for one-night stands.  But then he meets Sonia, a conscientious hotel chambermaid, and they instantly hit it off.  He takes her to his security job in the country, and while there, the huge country estate he guards is robbed and neither Guido or Sonia come out of it unscathed.  The rest of the movie is a mystery, billed as a psychological thriller, I would definitely agree.  As an onlooker you're trying to figure out what's going on and just as you have a glimmer, a real  twist is added , and then another, to keep you just enough off balance ..... in a great way.  A good one.

MOVIE - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Wow. An incredible, topnotch movie.
Released 3-19-2010
R (2:34)
6-13-10 at the Loft
RT: 86% cag: Do I Dare Rate This as My Highest? 97%
Director: Niels Arden Oplev
In Swedish, with subtitles
From the book by Stieg Larsson

NOTE: There was some incredibly graphic violence in this movie that was extremely disburbing.

But, WHAT A MOVIE! Incredbile storytelling, fantastic acting, setting and tone and mood that just worked perfectly together. Within ten minutes I wasn't even realizing that I was reading subtitles. And since I come from a Swedish background, hearing the lilting accents, checking out the countryside, and even having one of the small towns included that are part of my own family history was pretty cool.

Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist, was set up, charged with libel, and as the film begins, has been sentenced to six months incarceration. He has six months before he has to submit to this. So when a wealthy industrialist and CEO of a powerful family conglomerate hires him to investigate the 40-year-old disappearance of his much-loved niece, Harriet, he takes on the job and moves to a cottage on the Vanger property in northern Sweden, away from the craziness of Stockholm.

Lisbeth Salander is a 24 year old computer hacker with lots of baggage, a trouble past, and a dozen reasons to be sullen. She has dozens of piercings, a huge tattoo on her back, and a cigarette constantly between her lips. Her new probation officer is a sexual predator that is one of the nastiest I've ever seen portrayed. But Lisbeth is smart. She retaliates. And since she was the researcher that helped put Mikael away, she realizes that he's innocent and keeps hacking into his harddrive to see what he's up to.

Well, the two stories come together when she joins him to help him investigate.

So we are really examing two scenarios - hers, and their investigation. What a story, so well told. This movie does it justice. I've heard talk they're going to do an American edition. Why? I don't think they could top this one.

I'm really glad I didn't read the book before I saw the movie. The suspense was wonderful. But NOW....I wanna read the book!

47. The Messenger - Jan Burke

Simon & Schuster, 2009
HC $25.00
305 pages
for: adults
Rating: 5, gotta say it...couldn't put it down.

Well....this is a "supernatural thriller." No vampires, phew. But, one or two immortals in a society of humanity. Southern California humanity. LA foothills humanity. No specific descriptions of the setting, unfortunately, but a generalized sunny southern California. And a dog is one of the protagonists. Now, I am not a dog lover. But I couldn't put this book down. A really good mystery.

The book doesn't have different speakers, per se, but we switch back and forth to see the story from different perspectives. Amanda Clarke, early 20ish orphaned rich kid who doesn't work and roams around a big, expensive, LA foothills house. Tyler Hawthorne, 24 plus a few hundred years, Amanda's new next door neighbor. He's a messenger. He can hear the wishes of the comatose almost-dead and help them bring closure to devastated family. And he is indestructable, as long as his trusty, huge dog Shade is nearby. And then Amanda becomes the first person he has really confided in since his demise during the Battle of Waterloo.

Add one evil, ancient, supernatural being that has been turned into ashes and kept in a locked box at the bottom of the sea, a set of bickering cousins, and lots of people that are greatful to Tyler, and there's the story. Burke also threw in a foursome of ghosts - Amanda's dead parents aunt, and uncle, but I found this somewhat superflous and unneeded. Oh well, I could never think up a plot like this, so best leave it to the pros.

It looks like Jan Burke writes mystery short stories and a series of books based on Irene Kelly, an LA cop or investigator or something. These started appearing in 1993, and the library doesn't have the first five or six, so I'll have to track them down at Bookman's or online. But I'm looking forward to checking them out.